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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29609379">Time Has Come Today</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaudeZbornak/pseuds/MaudeZbornak'>MaudeZbornak</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>1960s, Activism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - 1960s, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Background GingerRose, Ben Solo Chainsmokes Until Rey Gets Him To Stop, Ben Solo is a Good Partner, Ben Solo is a Hippie, Car Sex, Drama, Drama &amp; Romance, Everybody in the van we're going to the drive-in, F/M, POV Rey, Protests, Romance, Sex, Sex in a Car, Sex in a van, Slow Burn, Slow Burn Rey/Ben Solo, Slow Burn Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Time Travel, Unprotected Sex Because It's the 60s, Vietnam War</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 16:30:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>56,417</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29609379</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaudeZbornak/pseuds/MaudeZbornak</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by the film "Somewhere In Time" and this tweet: https://twitter.com/Elopez7228/status/1362147118262214657</p><p>Moodboard by GingerSolo</p><p>2018: Rey’s first assignment as assistant curator at The Naboo Gallery is an exhibition of the Sixties counterculture movement. Sorting through the collections, she is shocked to see herself in a photo with the iconic activist Ben Solo, taken thirty years before she was born.</p><p>1968: Temperatures are rising, the war in Vietnam rages on, and the world is nowhere close to peace. Ben Solo refuses to give up until the U.S. pulls every last troop, and  is encouraged by a vision, a young woman who appears one day out of nowhere…</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Rey &amp; Ben Solo, Rey &amp; Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>144</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Reylo Prompt Fills (@reylo_prompts)</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>As the summary notes, this story was inspired by a mood board tweet from "Elopez7228." My thanks for the prompt. If you haven't seen "Somewhere In Time," I recommend it. That movie made me fall in love with Christopher Reeve.</p><p>As this story involves a volatile time in U.S. history, there will be content notes as applicable per chapter. Tags and characters will be updated as I go along. Unlike my other stories which have been "pantsed," I have to do a bit of research on this one. :-) I should note, too, I wasn't around in the 60s and will do my due diligence to make this authentic as possible. I will own all continuity errors, so this should be an interesting journey for all of us.</p><p> </p><p>Thank you for being a friend.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div>
  <p>
    
  </p>
</div><p>
  <em>
    <strong>Friday, June 22, 2018</strong>
  </em>
</p>
<p>Every morning for the past year, Rey Burke woke with the sunrise and jogged a five-mile loop up and down the Oceanfront boardwalk before preparing for work. The ensuing thirty-minute commute to work in heavy traffic did little to frustrate her, so long as her coffee stayed hot and the radio kept her entertained. Today, in particular, her mood had lifted to new heights. This marked the first anniversary of her position as assistant curator at The Naboo Gallery, the best damn job in the world.</p>
<p>To her delight, her boss acknowledged the milestone by presenting her with a pink box, tied in string, from Rey’s favorite bakery. She set it on Rey’s desk and took the chair opposite her. “I was thinking we might share these after lunch,” said Mon Mothma, smiling. “Today is one to celebrate in more ways than one.”</p>
<p>Judging from the glow on the older woman’s face, Rey hoped it meant good news on a specific front. Among their other duties, they’d spent the past eight months researching and collecting materials for <em>Time Has Come Today</em>, an exhibition on the 50th anniversary of key events in the Sixties counterculture movement. Robert Kennedy’s assassination, the protests at the Democratic National Convention, rebellion and anti-war sentiment versus the establishment.</p>
<p>Rey had loved every stage of the exhibit’s development. Since receiving word of the assignment she devoured books on the era, set up recorded interviews with people on both sides of the issues, and sorted through miles of photos and film footage. The exhibit was scheduled to debut on the first day of August and run through the end of the year, and they were nearly set to show an amazing and diverse collection of media.</p>
<p>That Mon implemented Rey’s ideas of tying in contemporary activism -- Occupy Wall Street, Black Lives Matter -- into the exhibit boosted Rey’s confidence. This was her first crack at curating a show, and she couldn’t wait until opening night. Mon’s news this morning further elevated her spirits.</p>
<p>“Last night,” her boss said, rather coyly, “I received a phone call from Bazine Netal.”</p>
<p>Rey’s breath left her body. “And?”</p>
<p>Mon folded her hands on the desk, tilting her head to one side in pause before speaking. “She’s agreed to loan us some of her father’s items.”</p>
<p><em>Hot damn.</em> Rey wanted to whoop for joy at finally obtaining the missing link to complete the exhibit. No retrospective of this time in history would be complete without something attached to one of the decade’s best-known activists. “Mon, this is amazing news.”</p>
<p>Mon clasped her hands together and stood. “Come walk with me.”</p>
<p>Rey followed her out of the offices and into the atrium of the art museum. The elegantly appointed space featured marble flooring and fountain installations along the back wall. A large white Chihuly chandelier hung from the tall ceiling; its illuminated curling fingers seemed to point at the four arched doorways, each of which led to a different exhibition hall. The gallery wouldn’t open for another hour yet, and she and Mon slipped behind the large partition blocking the first entrance.</p>
<p>Inside, they walked past framed photographs and video kiosks looping archival news footage of the Vietnam War and the protests resulting from it. Pedestals displayed vintage clothing and other items under glass -- among them musical instruments, handmade jewelry, and protest signs.</p>
<p>Rey caught sight of the mini theater space off to one side, a darkened room in which the interviews they’d recorded would play on a continuous schedule. She was about to ask whether they had secured the subject in question when Mon broke into her thoughts. “We need to clear out this corner,” her boss said, gesturing to an array of media depicting the history of the convention riots and Chicago 7 trial. Everything looked too spread out, only because they lacked the content they’d just now been promised. “I already have the graphic design team working on signage.”</p>
<p>“Will Mrs. Netal be bringing everything to us?” Rey asked. “When can we expect it?” She was eager to sort through what the woman had for them.</p>
<p>“Actually, we’re going to her. Mrs. Netal cares for her father now, and is reluctant to leave the house. What do you say we head up after lunch?”</p>
<p>“I say yes,” Rey said. Her heart lurched, thrilled for this new development in the first exhibit she helped to curate. Not only that, she was likely going to meet Ben Solo, the legend himself.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rey watched the scenery pass from Mon Mothma’s car, anticipating their arrival at Bazine Netal’s house. She was the only daughter of Ben Solo and his former wife, now deceased, and by her design the main point of contact for retrieving media for the exhibit. One of Rey’s tasks as Mon’s assistant had been to reach out to various private collectors, museums, libraries and notable figures of the era to secure loans for the displays. Ben Solo had been the lone holdout until now.</p>
<p>Rather, Bazine Netal. Rey never spoke to the man; the daughter answered initially for him, until she stopped answering altogether. It baffled Rey that the woman ghosted the gallery, since Ben Solo remained a vocal activist for social justice, even at the age of seventy-eight. Of course, most of his output occurred through social media, and Rey followed all of his accounts once the project was greenlit.</p>
<p>“You’re lost in thought,” Mon said as she took the exit toward the north end of the beach.</p>
<p>“I was wondering why Mrs. Netal changed her mind at the eleventh hour. I mean, I’m glad she did,” Rey said. “I’m sure people coming to see the exhibit would remark about the absence of Ben Solo material, given that he’s local.”</p>
<p>“I heard a rumor he’d suffered a stroke. That’s why he hasn’t been out in public lately,” Mon said. “Either way, Bazine Netal sounds like a helicopter parent.”</p>
<p>Or else she was embarrassed by her father’s legacy. Rey had studied up on the man; Ben Solo was pure hippie in 1968. She closed her eyes to bring up the images found online. Shaggy black hair framing a roughly handsome face, piercing dark eyes, round John Lennon glasses. A scruff of beard a girl would love to feel scraping across her shoulders and down her bare back…</p>
<p><em>Calm down, girl.</em> Ben Solo had over half a century on her now. Though, what recent photos she’d found of the man showed him leaning into silver fox territory.</p>
<p>Not that she was into that sort of thing. Her interest in Ben Solo was strictly attached to this exhibit.</p>
<p>Bazine Netal lived on the corner of a high-numbered street that dead-ended at the beach. The house fronted the ocean, and a two-door garage with a wooden door faced the road. Rey noticed a sun deck on the roof, not an uncommon feature for homes in the area. Rey lived further inland, and therefore envied their view.</p>
<p>No driveway, so Mon had to park on the side of the road. As they entered the gate leading to a side door, they were greeted by a woman with long dark hair. Bazine Netal wore bright red lipstick and a floral, maxi-length beach dress one might put over a swimsuit. “Thank you for coming out,” she said in greeting, shaking their hands. “I also apologize for the lateness in choosing stuff to send you. It had nothing to do with your museum.”</p>
<p>“It’s not necessary to go into detail if you don’t want to. We’re grateful you and your father decided to contribute,” Mon said. They followed Bazine through the door that led to her kitchen.</p>
<p>Bazine took them through a spacious living area awash in pastels and into a smaller room -- a study with bare walls and boxes on the desk and floor. “My father can be contrary at times. He never fails to speak his mind, especially about this current administration,” Bazine rolled her eyes, “but every time the subject of this exhibit came up he’d put it off. Would you believe it finally took one of the women you interviewed to convince him?”</p>
<p>Rey was curious, but Mon seemed more interested in getting the boxes into her car before either Bazine or her father suffered a change of heart. “We’re glad she did, and thank you, Mrs. Netal,” Mon said. “Is your father home? We’d love to thank him personally.”</p>
<p>Bazine shook her head. “He’s taken his dog out to the beach. They spend most of their mornings there, it’s his happy place.”</p>
<p>Mon murmured that perhaps they’d meet at the opening night reception. The daughter was noncommittal about that. Mon then gave Rey a look that said <em>Let’s take this stuff and go.</em></p>
<p>Rey walked out with Bazine, each carrying a heavy file box. “I watched a documentary about the protest your father staged before The Who concert here fifty years ago,” he said. “It must have been interesting to have lived with a father like that.”</p>
<p>“I used to think everybody had a father like mine.” Bazine laughed. “He kept the same circle of friends most of his life. All radicals and thinkers, and doers. Yet when he speaks of those days, he doesn’t get personal. It’s all politics.”</p>
<p>Rey set the box in the trunk of Mon’s car. “I guess he figured that was more important.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, but he obviously has stories. He hung out with Bob Dylan, Abbie Hoffman...and then there’s all the women.”</p>
<p>Rey didn’t have to ask. The documentary mentioned a number of Ben Solo’s romantic conquests, confirmed and rumored. Hippie free love, and all that.</p>
<p>Rey’s phone rang; the museum was calling. She excused herself while Bazine returned to the house, and she paced a stretch of road as she clarified the events calendar with the museum’s marketing manager. When she rang off, she saw she’d walked the fifty feet to the public beach access path. A yellow Lab, his fur matted wet and smelling of ocean brine, was galloping her way.</p>
<p>“Hey there,” she greeted the enthusiastic dog, and let him sniff her slacks. “Did you have fun at the beach? What’s your name?”</p>
<p>“His name is Wicket.”</p>
<p>Rey looked up as the older man approached. <em>His</em> name, she knew. Ben Solo was dressed for the early summer weather in white linen pants and an unbuttoned blue shirt over a matching-colored tee. His left forefingers were hooked into a pair of slip-on Vans and in his other hand he carried a chewed-up tennis ball.</p>
<p>Whatever seventy-eight was supposed to look like, the man made it good. He skewed quite younger in appearance. His hair still held that Sixties shag style, but it was mostly gray -- what she could see under his hat. He was clean shaven now, tanned by the sun, with attentive eyes that could no doubt stop conversations.</p>
<p>He caught her gaze and stopped short of a greeting, mouth gaping a bit. Rey held out her hand.</p>
<p>“Mr. Solo, I’m Rey Burke. I’m here with Mon Mothma to --”</p>
<p>“I know who you are,” he cut in. The astonishment in his tone surprised her. She thought for a moment he might renege on loaning them his personal items, but the older man then shook his head. “That is to say...Mon Mothma. You’re with that museum.”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>He lifted his hand in a signal and the dog left her to sit at his feet, panting. “Did you get everything you need?”</p>
<p>“I believe so. Mr. Solo --”</p>
<p>“Ben.”</p>
<p>Rey gave a nervous laugh. “Ben...thank you for your contribution. I do hope you’ll come to the opening reception to see the exhibit in its entirety.”</p>
<p>“Will you be there?” he asked.</p>
<p>“Of course. I helped curate.”</p>
<p>He smiled. “I wouldn’t miss it, then.” Ben paused a moment, then asked. “By any chance, did you attend Old Dominion University?”</p>
<p>“Uh, yes.” Talk about a question coming out of left field. “How did you…?”</p>
<p>“Majored in history, yes?”</p>
<p>Two for two. How did he know this about her? Rey then remembered her bio on the museum’s website. Perhaps Ben had researched the venue before deciding to give his life’s work. “And a minor in art history.”</p>
<p>“That I didn’t know. It makes sense. Did my daughter show you the van?”</p>
<p>“The van?” Surely he didn’t mean the famed Solo Samba, the multi-windowed VW microbus that carried Ben and his merry band of peaceniks across the country? Oh, to have that as part of the exhibit. “You still have it?”</p>
<p>“Would you give up your first child?” He dropped the shoes and shoved in his feet. “Come have a look. We’ll see if there’s any magic left in it.”</p>
<p>Ben clicked his tongue and Wicket stood to attention. Gesturing for Rey to walk ahead, they started for the house. Rey made small talk along the way, glancing back every few seconds to see Ben staring at her. With interest or adoration, she couldn’t tell. It put her on edge, yet at the same time intrigued her.</p>
<p>Was this older man trying to flirt with her?</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Holy cow.”</p><p>She helped Ben open the garage doors to reveal a perfectly preserved, 1967 Volkswagen Samba bus. Beige top with the lower half painted bright purple and decorated with rainbows, peace signs, doves and other symbols of the day.</p><p>Wicket tottered deeper into the garage and slipped through the dog-sized opening in the door leading into the house. With Ben’s consent, Rey reached out to touch the side bearing the word LOVE in a large curlicue script. “I just watched a documentary about you,” she told him. “The footage of the van...this hasn’t changed a bit.”</p><p>“We keep her out of the sun, unlike me,” Ben said and laid a palm on the top corner. “Still runs, purrs like a caffeinated kitten, though we’ve had to replace parts over the years. Would you like to go for a ride?”</p><p>Was he kidding? She’d have called shotgun in a heartbeat if she didn’t have to return to the museum. “Perhaps a rain check on that?”</p><p>“At least see the inside.” Ben opened the side door to reveal a hippie man cave on wheels. The interior was hollowed out to accommodate a mattress and milk carton shelves stuffed with books and notepads. Yellowed photographs and newspaper clippings were tacked or taped to the inside, alongside colorful stickers that had discolored or flaked away over time. Rey saw, too, where people had written words in marker ink -- quotes relevant to the period. Even a few phone numbers. <em>For a good time call Poe...</em></p><p>“‘Smoke weed for peace,’” she read one message aloud.</p><p>“Not all of them make sense,” Ben said. “It’s what happens when you smoke too much weed.”</p><p>The back bench seat served as storage as well, holding a portable television and other belongings. She watched Ben crawl inside and sit cross-legged on the sleeping area, surprised when he held out his hand.</p><p>“It’s not just a van, it’s an experience,” he said in invitation, and tossed his hat on the driver’s seat. “You may appreciate your exhibit more if you absorb some of the history, and we made quite a bit here.”</p><p>Among other things, Rey was certain. <em>Sure, what the hell?</em> She climbed in and sat opposite Ben, feeling the lumpy mattress roll underneath her buttocks. She breathed deeply and swore she detected the scent of marijuana smoked decades ago, and something else. Ink, maybe. “If this van could talk,” she wondered aloud.</p><p>“She’d ask where you’ve been all this time, Rey.”</p><p>Rey looked at him, confused. Ben Solo’s cheerful disposition faded with the loss of light coming into the garage. A cloud must have blocked the sun at the moment, for it grew quite shaded.</p><p>“I can’t believe I’m seeing you, after all these years. How is it that you look exactly the same as when we met?”</p><p>“Excuse me?” Rey asked. Odd. What did he mean by years? “We met just a few minutes ago. I doubt I’ve changed much in our short walk from the beach.” She gave a nervous laugh. He didn’t return it.</p><p>“I searched for you all over after you disappeared,” he said, his expression serious. “For years, I saw your face in every crowd at every protest, and the closer I got it turned out to be somebody else.” His voice cracked. “Where did you go, Rey? Why did you leave me?”</p><p>What was happening? Rey’s hands turned cold and her heart beat faster. “Ben...Mr. Solo, I’m not sure what you mean.”</p><p>“You don’t remember.” Ben let out a heavy sigh and looked around the van. “Does nothing here look familiar? This van hasn’t changed.”</p><p>“In the film --”</p><p>“The film. Fuck the film. It didn’t tell the whole story. It didn’t tell much truth, either.” Ben raised a fist but brought it down lightly in his lap. “We drove in this van to pick up copies of <em>The Rebellion</em> to distribute. I took you to the drive-in in this van.”</p><p>She looked at him, speechless. How could she answer these claims?</p><p>Ben stared her down. “I made love to you in this van, Rey. Right where you’re sitting now.”</p><p><em>What?</em> “Mr. Solo, that’s not possible. I never lived during the Sixties. I wasn’t even<em> born</em> in the Sixties.” Rey blinked and tears formed. Why was he saying such things? Mon had hinted Ben Solo might have health issues. The stroke rumor...but if he’d had one it may not have been severe. Dementia, maybe? He was obviously confusing her with another woman.</p><p>“Mr. Solo,” she said again.</p><p>“My name is Ben.” His voice turned sharp. “Some days I still hear you calling out my name…” He lowered his head a moment, and peered up at her again. “Was it Bazine who drove you away? I never loved her. You have to understand that.”</p><p>“Your daughter?”</p><p>“Her mother. They have the same name. I married her because she… You really don’t remember being with me, do you?” Ben asked, narrowing his eyes. He looked pained, and the air in the van stifled Rey. It wasn’t a good idea to come in here with him, and her mind raced for a graceful way to exit without upsetting him further.</p><p>Another voice broke the silence, and Rey relaxed.</p><p>“Dad? Are you out here?” Ben’s daughter came into view and she hurried into the garage. “Dad, what are you doing in the van? Wicket came into the house without you and I got worried.” Bazine poked her head inside, registering surprise on seeing Rey. “What’s going on?”</p><p>“Nothing untoward, my dear. Just giving my new friend the five-cent tour. Come help me out.”</p><p>Like flipping a switch. The impassioned Ben Solo pleading with Rey to remember a non-existent love affair had turned back into the pleasant old man from the beach. He took Bazine’s hand and exited the van feet first. Rey crawled out behind him.</p><p>“I was telling Ms. Burke I wish to loan the van for their exhibit,” he said, and turned to Rey. “If there’s room in your little museum for it.”</p><p>Rey opened her mouth but couldn’t bring the words. It was a quick, cool cover story, but surely he didn’t mean it?</p><p>“Of course there is room!” This from Mon, now joining the party. She introduced herself to Ben and added, “This is very generous of you. I can have an agreement drafted for this today, since it wasn’t on the original list of items on loan.”</p><p>“I’m fine to trust you with it, and don’t put it on display where people can’t touch it. No velvet ropes or signs telling people not to touch it.” Ben closed the side door and laid a hand on the LOVE sign. “Let the kids crawl around in it, soak up some of the mojo. Lord knows they could use it.”</p><p>“Dad…” Bazine said it like an adult scolding a child.</p><p>“It’s just an automobile, Baz. A thing.” He seemed to glare at Rey as he said that. “I’ll ask Leia to drop it off later today. She’s my granddaughter. The only other person who knows how to drive it,” he told Mon and Rey.</p><p>Mon offered her profuse thanks one more time and guided Rey out of the garage. “We have so much to do to incorporate your inventory into the exhibit. And make room for the van,” she said.</p><p>“You can’t stay a while longer?” Ben asked. The notion frightened Rey, thinking of the potential awkwardness of the situation. What if Ben mentioned he’d been Rey’s lover in front of her boss and his daughter?</p><p>Thankfully, Mon advised that they had a busy schedule today. “You are welcome to stop by the museum any time to preview the exhibit,” she added.</p><p>Ben kept his gaze fixed on Rey as he spoke. “I may just do that.” He nodded. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Mothma. Ms. Burke.”</p><p>Rey said her feeble-voiced goodbyes and got into the car, avoiding his eyes. As Mon drove away, Rey looked in the side rear view mirror. Ben Solo stood in the road, watching until they turned onto a side street.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It should have thrilled her to have an entire file box of Ben Solo’s personal photographs, speech transcripts, and copies of his weekly newspaper, <em>The Rebellion</em>, to explore. Yet, Rey had difficulty concentrating for the memory of her haunting conversation with the man. She sat in her office with the door closed, staring at a selection of items on her desk but not really looking.</p>
<p>She needed to snap out of it. Mon wanted her recommendations by the end of the working day. Rey set up the Spotify playlist she created, inspired by the exhibit, to get in the mood. She turned on her oil diffuser and the fragrance of eucalyptus filled the space. Nothing helped.</p>
<p>The photographs were mostly black and white, some of which had featured in the newspaper that Ben Solo had edited and published. <em>The Rebellion</em> ran for eight years, from 1966 to 1973, with a circulation of 200,000 at its peak. According to the documentary she’d watched, Ben’s volunteer staff would sometimes busk on the boardwalk for donations to pay printing costs while he hustled for advertisers. Every week they'd distribute the paper throughout the state and mail it to subscribers as far as California. Many famous figures in the peace movement took the newspaper and even gave Ben interviews.</p>
<p>As Ben’s reputation in the counterculture grew, like-minded people with deep pockets gave their endorsements and money to help. He’d even been asked to join the men who would become known as the Chicago 7 to their protests, but for some reason never showed. Rey thought about the scene in the documentary where Ben was asked point blank why, and he refused to talk.</p>
<p>A thought came to her. She brought out her phone and called up a Youtube channel that offered clips of the doc. She played one that focused on that part of the interview. Ben was in his fifties at the time of filming.</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You were planning to drive the Samba to Chicago.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN: Yes.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You never made it, however. Some would say you dodged a bullet by missing the arrest and subsequent trial.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN (shaking his head): I don’t know, did I?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You don’t believe your no-show hurt your standing in the community?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN: There were more important things happening in my life at the time.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: Like what?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN: I don’t wish to discuss it.</em>
</p>
<p>The clip ended on that tense note, with Ben’s gaze dark and cold. Rey thought he had the look of a caged animal searching for an escape. What had kept Ben from Chicago?</p>
<p><em>Was I involved?</em> “No,” she said to herself. It was ridiculous. Ben Solo had confused her with another woman from his time.</p>
<p>Rey picked up a photo of Ben surrounded by other notables, deep in conversation. Kurt Vonnegut, Jane Fonda, Dennis Hopper. The way he sat in the shot -- hunched forward, elbows on knees, holding a Coke can and a cigarette -- gave off a rugged sexiness that drew the eye more toward him than anybody else in the picture.</p>
<p>She had to admit, she’d have had an affair with this man, in his time. “You were certainly something.” The picture went into the <em>Yes</em> pile.</p>
<p>A knock fell on her door and Mon Mothma stuck in her head. “The van’s here.”</p>
<p>Rey followed her out to the exhibit hall. The double exit doors in the grand room were wide enough to accommodate a vehicle, as it was necessary for hauling large sculptures. She and Mon watched as one of the staff waved in the slow driving Solo Samba into the designated space. Mon had arranged for the pedestal displays to be moved to one side to avoid damage.</p>
<p>The van puttered as a classic Volkswagen should. Rey’s heart expanded with joy to see it in action. Once in place, the driver cut the engine and stepped out. She was a short, pretty young woman with her brown hair gathered in a ponytail. She approached with a sunny smile and dark eyes similar to her grandfather’s. “I’m Leia Netal,” she said. “I’m supposed to give these to Rey Burke?”</p>
<p>“That’s me.” Rey hoped Mon didn’t take offense at being passed over. She accepted the keys and the paper gift bag. “What’s this?”</p>
<p>“Grandpa said you should borrow it, to help you with writing additional marketing content for the exhibit. He specifically said he doesn’t want it displayed,” Leia said.</p>
<p>Mon invited Leia into her office to pick up the forms for the van. Rey thanked her and returned to her office. She pulled out the leather-bound journal and slid her fingertips down the cover.</p>
<p><em>1968</em> was emblazoned on the front. An entire year of Ben Solo’s personal thoughts. So much to absorb here, perhaps the foundations of his speeches, recounts of his protests and sexual conquests...secrets nobody else knew, perhaps not even his daughter. He’d entrusted this to her.</p>
<p>It occurred to Rey that Ben might expect her to return this personally. She dreaded another encounter like the one in the van, but if he had issues with memory she thought maybe he wouldn’t remember it the next time they met.</p>
<p>“Anything good?” Mon was back in Rey’s office, standing fully inside now. She explained she’d seen Leia Netal off to her rideshare.</p>
<p>“It appears to be a private journal.” Rey held up the book and slipped it into her messenger bag. “I’ll read it tonight. Maybe there’s something we can use for the social media posts.” They’d prepared a small program to accompany the exhibit, but that had already gone to the printers.</p>
<p>Mon looked impressed. “He must have been rather taken with you to lend you something like that.”</p>
<p>Rey nodded, and kept her thoughts to herself.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Snuggled in bed with a mug of hot tea and a sleeve of speculoos cookies, Rey opened the journal to page one. In addition to his bold block handwriting, Ben had taped photographs, matchbook covers, flower petals and other keepsakes within the book. It was the perfect time capsule, but she understood why Ben didn’t want it as part of the exhibit.</p>
<p>His journal hooked her from the first page. Ben’s determination to see the war to a swift end shone through in his writing, and the more she read, she realized his was a personal struggle.</p>
<p>She turned a page and saw the charred remnants of his draft card. Next to that was a caption: <em>Jacen should have done this</em>.</p>
<p>“Damn.” Rey wished they could have included at least this page in the exhibit. Jacen, she’d learned in earlier passages, was Ben’s younger cousin. He was called up shortly after graduating high school. As of the spring months, Ben had written that nobody knew of his whereabouts, or if he was still alive.</p>
<p>Through the journal, she also learned more about his parents, Han and Leia, than the documentary presented. They shared different beliefs about the government and war than their son, but didn’t wholly disown him. Rey got from the journal that his mother offered financial help at extreme low points. It might have explained how his granddaughter got Leia’s name. A love existed there, however tenuous.</p>
<p>She read into the small hours, unable to find a suitable break in the prose. It was all too compelling.</p>
<p>She reached July, and yawned. <em>Must keep reading</em>, she thought, and soldiered through to July 5th. The entry began with a recount of a meeting with a potential sponsor. The man Ben was courting held the belief his advertising dollars should allow him access to any of the young ladies working at<em> Rebellion</em> headquarters. Ben vented his frustrations on the page:</p>
<p>
  <em>Mr. Hutt eventually left, and while I was happy to get his check I wanted to burn sage to erase his stench. It appears I’ll need to keep an eye on him when he visits, to ensure nobody is molested.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Mother continues to admonish me for the general attractiveness of my staff, but what am I supposed to do? Tell a woman she’s too pretty to work here? Is it my fault more women are drawn to the cause and willing to help? Has she never read the Bible? Who stayed behind at the Crucifixion when every last disciple drifted away, unable to bear the sight of their Savior nailed to a tree? Who tended to His crypt and prayed there without ceasing? Women stayed through the best and worst of it.</em>
</p>
<p>Underneath that, he’d written in smaller script: <em>Not that I’m comparing myself to Christ or anything like that…</em> He punctuated the sentence with a Robert Crumb style doodle.</p>
<p>Rey laughed out loud at that, but turning the page and perusing the next passage had her nearly spilling her tea.</p>
<p>
  <em>Case in point. We welcomed a newcomer to the fold, a rather sharp sister named Rey Burke.</em>
</p>
<p>That woke her up.</p>
<p>Rey read further on, her heart pounding in her ears. Ben’s description of this Rey Burke matched her to a T. He painted her as one of “Rose’s strays,” someone who seemed older than her years and who could be a potential asset to <em>The Rebellion</em>. Ben revealed in this entry that he sought to test her journalism skills by interviewing a local man come home from the war on medical discharge.</p>
<p>She closed the book, now scared to read on. This had to be a coincidence. Burke was a common name, and though Rey didn’t know her biological family well the people who’d cared for her most of her life were okay with her keeping it. Her birth mother’s name wasn’t Rey, though...could this have been a relative?</p>
<p>Rey opened the book and flipped back to July when an envelope fell from the pages. It was addressed to her. The photo she found inside left her gasping for air.</p>
<p>It was her, smiling in a pair of light-tinted sunglasses, standing next to Ben. He held her close, and they looked into the camera with clear contentment. Her doppelganger wore a flower in her hair and a string of beads around her neck, close to an advanced state of hippiedom.</p>
<p>“No,” she said. Had to be a Photoshop, right? The picture looked genuine, though. Old. She never owned a pair of sunglasses like that.</p>
<p>She flipped it over and read an inscription that chilled her heart.</p>
<p>
  <em>Rey,</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>I’ve kept this photo close</em>
  <br/>
  <em>to my heart for 50 years.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>I never forgot you.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>Come back to me.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Ben</em>
</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Close to five in the morning, Rey let herself into the museum at the side employee entrance. The keycard would record her entry, but going through this way meant she’d avoid any alarms. It wasn’t unusual for employees to come and go at weird hours, anyway. Large exhibits often had people working late and coming in super early.</p>
<p>Since seeing the photograph, sleep evaded her. She had to know more, had to be certain.</p>
<p>Rey never brought work home; Ben’s journal had been the exception. All copies of <em>The Rebellion</em> remained in the file box in her office, and Rey sat in her flannels thumbing through the yellowed issues until she found one dated in July of 1968. The newspaper wasn’t large -- a folded tabloid ranging from twelve to sixteen pages. It was dated every Monday.</p>
<p>She laid out the July 15th issue on her desk and used a pair of tweezers to turn the pages. She wanted to keep her prints off the paper as much as possible to preserve it. This issue featured a front page interview by Ben with Pete Townsend ahead of the Who concert that same week, plus a below-the-gatefold story summarizing events that commemorated the first anniversary of the <em>Loving Vs. Virginia</em> decision in June.</p>
<p>On page three, another photo of past Rey. She’d written an editorial on the rights of the homeless. The piece read like her writing style, too. “How can this be?” she asked aloud.</p>
<p>At the end of the column read a short biography: <em>Rey Burke is a reporter for The Rebellion.</em></p>
<p>She looked again at the photo. The ink was faded a bit, but there was no mistaking that face.</p>
<p><em>Holy shit.</em> “I was there,” she whispered to the empty room. Somehow, some way, she had existed in 1968. Ben, in this present time, had claimed they were lovers. She had yet to read that far in the diary to know more details...if he’d shared them there.</p>
<p>She had been there. How did she get there?</p>
<p>Moreover, could she get back?</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. No idea if Kurt, Jane, or Dennis ever hung out together, though Dennis made a movie with Jane's brother once. :)<br/>2. Robert Crumb is a cartoonist and satirist, known for his underground comics like "Fritz the Cat."<br/>3. Loving Vs. Virginia was a landmark US Supreme Court case ruling that bans on interracial marriages were unconstitutional.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Two-chapter update today (3/9/21)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <strong>Saturday, June 23, 2018</strong>
  </em>
</p>
<p>Rey knew of a bookstore housed in an antique mall, located near the downtown area, that specialized in esoteric subjects. Usually when she shopped in the building, she tended to spend more time browsing the vintage jewelry and old Corelle dinnerware patterns, yet rarely bought anything. Today, her day off, she decided on a different path of research.</p>
<p>After her morning run and breakfast, she arrived at the mall as it opened. Numerous partitions filled with collectibles, clothing, junk and other curiosities filled the vast space, and Rey negotiated the crowded aisles to get to the section in the back designated as Amilyn’s Reading Nook. She walked through an open arch to discover narrower walkways, all bordered by floor-to-ceiling shelves of books.</p>
<p>It was dimly lit in this enclosed space, and Rey inhaled the dust and faint whiffs of patchouli. One wouldn’t find the current bestsellers here. Rey paused to study old spines emblazoned with fading gold and black print. She saw history books she would have picked up any other day, self-help manuals, and treatises on the occult. Amilyn, or whoever managed this section, had labeled the shelves well, but Rey wasn’t certain of the category she should check first.</p>
<p>She turned a corner and stopped short on seeing a woman seated at a small round table in a corner, blocking two shelves. The woman wore a black shawl over a white frilled blouse and blue jeans; her hair was a pastel shade of purple with lipstick to match. Atop the velvet tablecloth sat two unboxed, tattered tarot decks.</p>
<p>“Good morning.” The woman sounded rather bright for the early hour.</p>
<p>“Hello.” Rey nodded and looked past her at the books behind the tarot setup. A card reading wouldn’t help her today, and she tried not to act rudely.</p>
<p>“Is there something specific you’re looking for?” the woman asked. “I’m Amilyn. I know every title in the store.”</p>
<p>Rey inhaled. It might sound silly however she phrased it, but Rey surmised maybe this woman had heard everything in her line of work. “I don’t have a title in mind, because I don’t know if such a book exists,” she said.</p>
<p>Amilyn listened, no judgement in her expression.</p>
<p>Rey moved closer. “I’m looking for something on time travel. Not fiction, no stories. I’m looking for...theory and practice, I guess.”</p>
<p>“Something like astral projection?” Amilyn twisted in her chair and pointed to a shelf above her. “There are several titles I can recommend.”</p>
<p>“Actually, I’m looking for something that covers the...physical aspect of it,” Rey said. “Like, can I bodily travel back in time?”</p>
<p>To her credit, Amilyn didn’t laugh or deliver a reaction that scoffed at Rey’s request. She did gesture for Rey to take the other chair, then leaned over the table. “If you don’t mind my asking, is this something you’ve attempted, or perhaps experienced?” she asked. “You know, like a glitch in the matrix, when you see something that’s out of place?”</p>
<p>“Like what?”</p>
<p>Amilyn shrugged. “Say you had a cat that died. Weeks or months later, you’re home alone and you hear a cat meowing in the next room, or you glance one way and see the food bowl you disposed of...just for a moment. Then it’s gone.” The woman looked dead serious as she talked. “I can cite more examples that have happened to me alone.”</p>
<p>“That sounds more like an alternate universe scenario, though,” Rey said. “I’m talking about physically traveling back to a different year, and if there is a theory to suggest or prove it’s possible. Maybe it can happen to a person, and that person has no memory of it until she receives evidence to the contrary.”</p>
<p>Amilyn picked up one of the decks, idly shuffling the cards. “I can guess this is not a hypothetical question,” she said. “Please tell me you have something to show me relevant to your query. It gets so boring here with people crab-walking past my table like I’m about to pounce.”</p>
<p><em>I guess this is your Christmas morning</em>, Rey thought, and reached into her purse. She held up the picture, purposely covering her face with her fingers. “This photo was taken in 1968. Do you know who this is?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, that’s Ben Solo. He’s been in here with his granddaughter.” Amilyn nodded. “He was a hottie back in the day. Still is, I suppose. A real GILF.”</p>
<p>“GILF?”</p>
<p>“Grandfather I’d Like to --”</p>
<p>“Gotcha,” Rey cut in. She switched hands on the photo. “The person next to him is me. This isn’t a Photoshop job, and that’s not my mother. I never really knew my mother, but I have pictures and we were not twins. How do I explain this, except that I was there?”</p>
<p>Amilyn took the photo after asking, and held it close for inspection. “That is fascinating. I don’t believe reincarnation would apply here, otherwise this would be an entirely different woman,” she said, and flicked her gaze at Rey. “You have absolutely no memory of posing for this picture?”</p>
<p>Rey decided not to tell Amilyn that she hadn’t met Ben until yesterday, in case that influenced the woman’s thoughts. “None. I’m twenty-five, born almost thirty years after that photo was taken. If I lived in 1968, it stands to reason I belonged there, yes?”</p>
<p>“Maybe,” Amilyn said. “It’s also possible you’re here now because you weren’t meant to be in 1968 and the universe corrected it somehow.”</p>
<p>Rey hadn’t considered that. Of course, she’d never considered asking somebody’s opinion about time travel until recently, too. It amazed her to have this conversation without laughing. “If that’s the case,” Rey said, “I want the opportunity to decide for myself.”</p>
<p>Amilyn returned the photograph and stood. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>The back office of Amilyn’s Reading Nook was a repurposed walk-in closet, also lined with shelves. These, however, had a tilt to them that made it look like stacks of books might avalanche on top of the bookstore proprietor’s cluttered desk at any second. Rey stood next to the wooden swivel chair in which Amilyn sat as she rummaged in a deep drawer.</p>
<p>“I have only ever done it once,” Amilyn was saying. “For years I convinced myself that I experienced a lucid dream, and a rather long one at that. Knowing that I’m not the only person out there with a potentially legit time travel history gives me hope it was real all along. I may just try it again.”</p>
<p>She straightened in her chair and handed Rey an old blue hardcover with red-lined pages. The spine read <em>The Time Tourist</em> by L. Calrissian. “This book was published nearly a hundred years ago,” Amilyn said, and explained the premise of how Mr. Calrissian used self-hypnosis to physically travel back a hundred years before his time.</p>
<p>“Mr. Calrissian was an avid student of spiritualism and parapsychology. He was born after the Civil War, to former slaves. His purpose of studying time travel was to go back far enough to help his parents become free earlier, and hopefully guide them to a better life.” Amilyn tapped the book. “He claims he succeeded.”</p>
<p>Rey thumbed through the pages of miniscule print. “That sounds risky. What if his parents never met as a result, forcing him out of existence?”</p>
<p>“If you read the book, you’ll learn how he planned for that. The technique he used is pretty straightforward.” Amilyn paused, and added, “It’s what I used.”</p>
<p>“Where, or when did you go?” Rey asked. Am I really asking this? Considering this?</p>
<p>“Regency England. I’ve always been drawn to that era. Jane Austen, the <em>Bridgerton</em> novels…” Amilyn’s countenance took on a dreamy expression. “It wasn’t quite like the movies portrayed it, but I enjoyed my time there.”</p>
<p>Rey wondered if this was genuine. As serious as the woman took her, was she chasing a dream? “Why didn’t you stay?”</p>
<p>“Different reasons, I guess.” She shrugged and looked around the tight space. “This dingy corner of the antique mall doesn’t compare, but at the end of the day I knew I wasn’t part of the <em>ton</em>. I was a contemporary thinker, and I knew one day I’d open my mouth and say something to arouse suspicion. So, I employed my ‘parachute,’ so to speak, and boom. I’m back in the present.”</p>
<p>“Parachute?”</p>
<p>Amilyn smiled. “Tell you what, that book’s on the house. Everything you need to know is in it. For payment, I only ask that if you make it to 1968 I want you to come back here and tell me about it. Either as you are now or as the seventy- or eighty-year-old woman who stayed.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <strong>Thursday, June 28, 2018</strong>
  </em>
</p>
<p>On Monday, Rey accompanied Mon to the printers to collect the additional signage for the exhibit. They were impressed by the quick turnaround of wall clings that would decorate Ben Solo’s corner of the exhibit. Rey supervised as a junior staff person affixed the larger-than-life-sized, two-dimensional image of Ben to the wall. He was wearing the same shirt as in the photograph of her.</p>
<p>It was a powerful pose, taken from a photograph during his speech in front of the old civic center known as “The Dome” for its geodesic shape. The image caught him in a moment between words, with one hand clutching a microphone at chest level while the other hung at his side, clenched in a hard fist. The tension in his jawline hinted the next sentence coming would stir the crowd. His heavy-lidded eyes behind his glasses seemed calmer, contradictory to the atmosphere of that day.</p>
<p>Rey had seen clips of the speech, home video from a spectator that day. Not much of it survived. As she watched the cling smoothed down to eliminate air bubbles she thought about watching the entire documentary a second time to see if she could find herself in it.</p>
<p>She divided her time Tuesday and Wednesday between meetings with the marketing department and working with Mon on the next exhibit, a retrospective of African-American art to begin in January and stretch beyond Black History Month. Rey looked forward to receiving the diverse collection borrowed from galleries around the country.</p>
<p>Today, nerves threatened to overtake her. Upon arriving at work, Mon reminded her of their special visitors. “The Ticos are due to arrive at eleven,” she said. “I invited them to lunch afterward, but unfortunately they have another engagement.”</p>
<p>Rey nodded and said nothing, but set up at her desk for the work day. Paige Tico and her sister Rose were in the thick of the protest scene, and Rose had volunteered for Ben at <em>The Rebellion</em>. The words<em> Rose’s stray</em> immediately popped into Rey’s head. From what she gathered in her research, Rose was the baby of the group, nineteen years old and eschewing her college education in favor of the anti-war crusade. Her sister, older by a few years, worked to support them and had kept the girl out of trouble. Eventually, Rose returned to school and pursued social work.</p>
<p>Rey’s palms turned cold at the thought of meeting the women. Would this be a reunion, of sorts? She was curious to see if either Tico sister would react on seeing her as Ben had. Of course, with fifty years passed, she didn’t want to get up any hopes of recognition.</p>
<p>She’d finished the Calrissian book in two days. After that and her talk with Amilyn the bookstore owner, Rey’s doubts about the improbability of time travel were fading. A plan formulated in her mind, but it would take specific details to get it right. Though, if the journal was correct in saying she met Ben on July 5th, it didn’t give her much time to prepare.</p>
<p>Closer to eleven, she stayed in her office and breathed in the diffused bergamot oil she’d set up until Mon knocked on her door. Her boss asked her to come out to the exhibit with the gallery’s phone, as they intended to record photos and video of the visit for their social media.</p>
<p>When Rey joined the group, she greeted two radiant women who looked far younger than their years. Neither one appeared to register the halting surprise of Ben Solo upon introductions. Rose, with her short dark hair in a bob, resembled a motherly version of the young hippie chick in the photos Rey perused. Paige, quiet and polite, maintained her long mane of hair. She hung back while her sister talked.</p>
<p>“Was I ever this young?” Rose asked, pulling Rey toward a photo of her with two other men, walking a picket line at the beach. Young Rose waved a sign reading <em>It’s a Big Enough Ocean For Everyone</em>. This had come from their private collection. In the video the museum had recorded for the exhibit, Rose talked of how certain communities attempted to defy the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by harassing non-whites in public places, like the beach, and chasing them away.</p>
<p>“Do you remember that day?” Rey asked. She looked at the two men flanking the teenager clad in a beaded halter and denim shorts. The tall, swarthy one was bare-chested with sideburns and sunglasses; the young black man wore a dark jacket and beret. Rey struggled to recall them, not from her research but from the time.</p>
<p>“Like yesterday. Cops ordered us to disperse, as usual. But we came back.” Rose tapped the side of her head. “Those years still play clear in my head.”</p>
<p><em>Look at me. Do you know me?</em> Rey wanted to ask a different question, but the buoyant Rose was off and striding toward the van.</p>
<p>“And how you managed to convince Ben to part with the Sexy Samba… I have to know,” Rose said. “Hey, Ben, what did they bribe you with?”</p>
<p>Rey remained rooted to the spot, her heart pulsing wild as she watched Ben walk from behind the van to meet Rose.</p>
<p>“Nothing, my dear,” he said. “I find it difficult to accept, after all these years, you still don’t believe in my generosity.”</p>
<p>Ben stood ramrod straight, his head tilted down to regard his old friend. He was dressed similar to their first meeting, now with a black Nirvana tee underneath his open gray linen shirt. Amilyn was right. The man was a GILF.</p>
<p>When Rey regained use of her limbs, she moved close to Mon and Paige. “Mr. Solo is here,” she said, then turned her head to cringe. Could she have said anything more ridiculous?</p>
<p>“I am. The warden was kind enough to give me a day pass.” Ben approached, Rose in tow. He bowed his head in greeting, looking directly at Rey as though daring her to break eye contact. “Ms. Burke. I told you to call me Ben.”</p>
<p>“Sorry,” she said, chastened.</p>
<p>“Why do you disparage your daughter like that?” Paige came forward with a scowling expression. “She is only looking out for your health.”</p>
<p>“My health is fine. I am not decrepit.”</p>
<p>“Really? How’s your cough?”</p>
<p>“Not as bad as fifty years ago when I gave up smoking.” Ben kept his line of vision on her as he talked. It was like he wanted to assure Rey he was of sound mind and body. “As for Baz’s hovering nature,” he added, “well, she is her mother’s daughter.”</p>
<p>“Baz, Senior was my friend,” Paige said. Now she was looking right at Rey. “She only wanted what was best for you, Ben.”</p>
<p>“I know. For her, too.”</p>
<p>Rey searched for a different focal point in the room. All these gazes fixed on her made her uncomfortable. Especially Paige Tico’s. Her narrowed eyes seemed to imply an indifference Rey felt she didn’t deserve.</p>
<p>“Ms. Burke,” Paige said, “I may have known your mother. Is she from the area?”</p>
<p>Rey shook her head. “I’m sorry, no. I didn’t know her well myself, in fact. She died when I was very young, and I moved here when I enrolled in college.”</p>
<p>Paige nodded, slow and thoughtful, then drifted toward a set of photos. Unlike her sister she remembered 1968 Rey, very likely.</p>
<p>Rey wanted to leave, but Mon had a hand on her shoulder. “I’d like to get a photo of the three of them by their picture.” She was referring to the framed wall shot of Ben flanked by the sisters in front of the Rebellion headquarters. “Then a few individual ‘then and now’ shots.”</p>
<p>Rey obliged, and spent the next several minutes playing photographer. The atmosphere lightened thanks to Rose’s enthusiasm; the older woman joked throughout the session and evoked memories that inspired her contemporaries to smile.</p>
<p>One in particular struck Rey. Rose pointed to one photo and cried, “Holy cow, I can’t believe you chose this one.” The snapshot captured young Rose in the act of shouting down a tight-looking man in a short haircut, who stared back with presumed contempt.</p>
<p>“I thought it spoke of the ‘us versus them’ narrative,” Rey told her. “Who is that man? I couldn’t find any information.”</p>
<p>Ben came forward to see the photo. “Oh, that was Rose’s boyfriend,” he said.</p>
<p>“He was not!” Rose gave an expression of disgust. “Armitage Hux was the square to beat all squares. His dick probably bent ninety degrees.”</p>
<p>“You don’t know for sure?” Ben needled his friend. Rose glowered back.</p>
<p>“Where is he now?” Rey asked.</p>
<p>“He passed years ago,” Ben said. “He was ill.” The sadness crossing his face implied something more serious than that.</p>
<p>Rey nodded. She asked Rose, “And you never married?”</p>
<p>Rose side-eyed her. “Dear, no man could keep up with me.”</p>
<p>“Hux tried, though,” Ben said. To Rey he added, “Hux loved nothing more than to yank Rose’s chain. How they never hooked up is beyond me.”</p>
<p>“Because he was a jackass!” Rose said and stormed away.</p>
<p>The laughter helped erase the years from Ben’s face, Rey noticed.</p>
<p>Her work done, Rey scrolled through the photographs on the phone, noting how the intensity in his eyes matched those of the pictures in her office. He was the same man, and continued to attract attention.</p>
<p>At the moment, he had drifted away and was now standing before the corner exhibit, staring at the wall cling, hands in his pockets. Mon had the Tico sisters off in another part of the exhibit. Rey couldn’t resist -- she lined up the shot and pressed the button.</p>
<p>Ben must have heard the click. He turned around and smiled at her. “At least you got my best side,” he said. “One hiding my face.”</p>
<p>“You shouldn’t say that.” Rey checked her work. This would work wonderfully on the museum’s Instagram. She nodded up at the cling. “What do you think?”</p>
<p>“Of this, or the whole exhibit? Either way, I’m impressed.” Ben twisted around to survey the space. “I never thought I’d live to see myself preserved in such a manner. I figured it would happen after I died, like with many people I’ve known.”</p>
<p>Rey nodded. Four of the Chicago 7 were gone now, and so were many others in the anti-war movement.</p>
<p>Ben crooked his head toward the van. “Can I show you something?” He didn’t give her a chance to answer. Rey followed him to the back of the van, aware that where they now stood hid them from the others.</p>
<p>She looked down and noticed the dent just above the left rear tire. “Oh no,” she said. “Did we do that bringing in the van? I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>“That’s been there, don’t worry about it.” Ben directed her to look through one of the back windows and pointed at some scrawl in red marker along the inside roof. She had to tiptoe to see better through the glass, and when her eyes adjusted she saw the inscription, though faded, plain as day.</p>
<p><em>R.B. was here</em>.</p>
<p>Ben hovered close. “It’s been there a while.”</p>
<p>Blood pounded hard through Rey’s head. “I’m sure it has. Those initials could mean anything.”</p>
<p>“Did you read my journal?” he asked.</p>
<p>She nodded. “Just up to early July.” She was afraid to go further, but she didn't know why. Maybe it was the prospect of a coming across heated passage, Ben describing making love to her.</p>
<p>“You ought to finish it. It gets better, until it doesn’t.” Ben’s voice was deep, gentle. Talking to her like they were more than mere acquaintances. “I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable.”</p>
<p>“I know,” Rey said, keeping her voice low. They stood close enough to touch, yet Ben behaved. Just him smiling down at her was enough to tingle her skin. “I’m not uncomfortable. I’m just...nervous.”</p>
<p>Ben laughed. Rey glanced across the room, hoping the others didn’t notice.</p>
<p>“How is that not the same thing?” he asked.</p>
<p>Rey whispered, trying to set an example. “It’s not only the journal, or the photo you gave me,” she said. “I found a <em>Rebellion</em> with...my byline. I’ve been trying to come up with an explanation for it all.”</p>
<p>“You think I haven’t?” Ben leaned against the back of his van. “A woman disappears from my life as mysteriously as she enters it, and I find her fifty years later and she hasn’t aged? The BBC would claim you’re a Time Lord.”</p>
<p>“I haven’t watched that show in years.” Oh, but she’d kill for access to a TARDIS.</p>
<p>“There is an explanation,” Ben said. “Just because I don’t know what it is doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist. Whatever it is, I know in my heart you are my Rey Burke. I see it.”</p>
<p>“If that’s true, it stands to reason Rose Tico would have recognized me,” Rey said. “I read far enough in the journal to know she’s the one who brought me to you.”</p>
<p>“It has been fifty years. Rose took in a lot of strays over that decade.” Ben winked. “I only took in one.”</p>
<p>His words drew Rey to look at him. Ben’s eyes hadn’t aged with the rest of him. They looked bold and intimately familiar. The man appeared completely lucid, regarding her with warmth.</p>
<p>“All I ask is that you open your mind, Rey.”</p>
<p><em>You also asked me to come back to you.</em> “I will,” she said. “I need more time.”</p>
<p>“Don’t use too much. I can’t wait another fifty years.” Ben stepped closer. Rey was aware of his size, his magnetism. If they were alone she might have kissed him.</p>
<p>Paige’s voice tore through the exhibit room and captured their attention. “Ben, we’re leaving.”</p>
<p>Ben let out a sigh. “The warden’s assistant,” he muttered. He smiled at Rey and nodded. “Ms. Burke, always a pleasure. I’ll see you soon, I hope.”</p>
<p>“Yes.” In this time or in the past, she’d soon find out.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <strong>Wednesday, July 4, 2018</strong>
  </em>
</p>
<p>The museum closed to visitors on the Fourth of July. Past experiences revealed that people preferred the beach and other outdoor activities on this holiday, despite the fact The Naboo Gallery utilized an awesome HVAC system. Rather than keep staff indoors all day with nothing to do, the board released everybody into the wild to soak up the sun.</p>
<p>In recent years, Rey would attend a barbecue hosted by her neighbors, followed by a group stroll to the beach after sundown to watch the fireworks. This time, she sent her regrets in order to prepare for...what? Either a life-changing journey, or a waste of a day.</p>
<p>Rey paced her bedroom, looking at the outfit she’d laid out on the mattress, trying to convince herself this would work. What other choice did she have? If Elon Musk was working on a time machine, he sure as hell was dragging his feet.</p>
<p>Then there were the remaining alternatives, either tap dancing around Ben Solo every time he brought up a connection between them, or avoiding him altogether. She liked the man, though, and her work with <em>Time Has Come Today</em> made it difficult to not see him. So that was out.</p>
<p>It wasn’t like she could start up a relationship with a man fifty years her senior, either. The idea intrigued her; she imagined Ben would be anything but dull. She also pictured his daughter freaking out over bringing home a lady friend the same age as Ben's granddaughter.</p>
<p>If indeed she’d existed fifty years ago, she wanted to experience it. The idea of pretending to know the present Ben’s memories didn’t appeal to her. She didn’t want to lie to him or anybody else.</p>
<p>Rey touched the yellow floral blouse and faded blue jeans she’d selected for the “trip.” Mr. Calrissian’s book noted the importance of authenticity during time travel meditation. Everything worn and carried on the person had to be from or before the intended target time. Rey found nearly everything she needed at the same antique mall that housed Amilyn’s bookstore.</p>
<p>She bought the vintage clothing, sandals, and a thin-strapped purse from a stall run by a woman named Magda who also did alterations. Magda had seemed put off when Rey asked if the colorful applique patches on the jeans had been sewn on prior to 1968 or later. <em>What difference does it make?</em> the woman had croaked, but Rey chose not to argue. They were the only pants in her inventory that fit.</p>
<p>Elsewhere in the store, she found a coin and stamp dealer and lucked out with a stack of uncirculated bills from 1965. The selection of ones and fives set her back a few hundred dollars. “Birthday present for a relative born that year,” she lied to the dealer. Like he cared. Afterward she went home and sorted through the large coffee can where she kept her spare change, and fished out all the coins dating 1967 and earlier.</p>
<p>This gave her the late Sixties look and enough cash to eat for a few days. As for the “parachute,” the item from the present to use to return home if necessary...did she need one? What if this worked, and instead of joining Ben Solo’s merry band of rebels things went south? A wrong turn on her part might get picked up for vagrancy or mugged.</p>
<p>In the end, she decided to take one, but secured it to the lining of her purse so it wouldn’t accidentally slip free. Rey had a badge from the museum, a 30th anniversary medal from this year. She pinned it to the bottom inner lining of the purse and hoped she wouldn’t have to employ it.</p>
<p>Rey looked out her window. The neighbors’ barbecue raged on, with Bruno Mars singing out from surround-sound speakers set up in the backyard. Perhaps this might be the last time she heard his music...for a long while. The fireworks at the beach were scheduled to begin at nine. Her goal was to head out around three in the morning and find a quiet spot on the sand. She couldn’t do it here. Her apartment complex was built twenty years ago and she wasn’t certain what was here in 1968.</p>
<p>She sat on her bed and looked around her apartment, and all the trappings of contemporary convenience. A computer with WiFi, her mobile phone, flatscreen on the wall… 1968 wasn’t a primitive time, but she reminded herself to watch her tongue and not say or do anything to arouse odd looks. Her mind drew back to a Back to the Future film, where Marty made reference to John F. Kennedy and was asked, “Who the hell is he?”</p>
<p>“I must be mad,” she told herself, and put the thought away. Mr. Calrissian’s book also stressed the need for belief. The mind was the tool designed to bring success.</p>
<p>With several hours to kill and many nerves to tamp down, Rey decided on a bubble bath. Who knew when she’d get to take another one? As she filled the tub she brought the Calrissian guide and Ben’s journal, the former to brush up on the notes, and the latter…</p>
<p>Contrary to Ben’s urging, she hadn’t read past the July 5th entry. She knew she should because it very likely revealed the day she “disappeared” from Ben’s life. She worried, though, about knowing too much of her alleged time in 1968. What if their first weeks together were spent in indifference, and arguments? Perhaps she wanted to create a new history with Ben rather than repeat his journal entries, and ultimately be led into some unpleasant situations.</p>
<p>Of course, to prevent ill will, she’d have to know what she was getting into, right? That meant reading the journal.</p>
<p>Rey slipped into the tub and carefully opened to the July 5th entry. She re-read the passage where Ben first encountered the “rather sharp sister.” Rey found his prose humorous and warm, and turning to the next day’s entry she discovered Ben had taken to Rey quickly on a professional level.</p>
<p>
  <em>She says she went to ODU, and given her age it would have been about the same time I was there. She would’ve been a freshman during my senior year. Funny how I don’t recall seeing her on camp</em>
</p>
<p>A loud boom sounded outside her apartment, rattling the foundation. Fucking neighbors couldn’t wait for nine o’clock and the professionals for fireworks. Rey let out a panicked yelp, which pitched high into bloody murder territory when she dropped Ben’s journal into the tub.</p>
<p>
  <em>Noooo! Rey, you idiot!</em>
</p>
<p>She fished the book out and slapped it on the towel sitting above her on the sink. Silently she prayed for as little damage as possible as she wiped down the leather cover. Her hopes sank with each passing second, however. The book had fallen into the soapy water while splayed open, and as she attempted to turn pages she saw they were soaked. The ink ran and blurred Ben’s words. The pasted keepsakes within turned pulpy and threatened to flake away.</p>
<p>Rey kept the journal wrapped in the towel, and let out a sob. She’d ruined it, an entire year of Ben Solo’s life, an irreplaceable treasure.</p>
<p>“This is why you don’t bring work home. <em>This</em> is why you don’t read books in the tub!” she shouted to herself. She dried off and put on a robe, the mood to soak away her stress broken. If anything, the incident left her more determined to make this meditation work.</p>
<p>In 1968, Ben would get his journal back, and she’d give him something to write about.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Thursday, July 5, 2018</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Rey parked her car along the same stretch of road near Bazine Netal’s beach house. She chose this spot for a number of reasons. For one, this neighborhood was one of the oldest in the area, and much of the landscape had changed little in the last fifty years. Where Rey would sit on the beach assured she’d be okay when she “arrived.”</p>
<p>For two, it was close to the new Marriott hotel constructed on the Oceanfront. If and when Rey awoke and didn’t see it, success.</p>
<p>For three, the idea of trying this close to Ben’s home gave her comfort. Perhaps the proximity might help. Ben had talked of mojo, and maybe he exuded enough to stretch out toward her.</p>
<p>Rey sat in her car for a moment, steeling herself. She was in quasi-hippie dress, holding a purse full of old money, and keeping her breath even. She’d forgone underwear, not for the time period but because she didn’t want present-day underthings to cause any hiccups in the process or launch her home when she undressed.</p>
<p>She’d left her mobile phone at home on her kitchen table, along with a note to whomever showed up to check on her in the event she didn’t come back. It simply read she had a family emergency out of state and offered no news on her return.</p>
<p>Now, with the engine off, she tucked her car keys under her seat. Before exiting, she picked up the photo of her with Ben, fixing on his face. His dark and unruly hair, the mustache bordering his smile, the two undone buttons of his shirt, exposing the silver chain and small medal around his neck.</p>
<p>This face served as her point of concentration, yet she had to leave the photo here because it was taken post-July 5th. She imprinted young Ben in her memory and left the car unlocked.</p>
<p>The beach was dark and quiet, save for the gentle roar of the ocean. Rey waited a moment for her vision to adjust and she walked the path on down the ramp partially buried with sand. It was a challenge to step where the surface wasn’t as hard-packed closer to the shore, but Rey picked a spot at random and sat. Looking ahead of her, she saw blackness, little movement on the water. One might think they could walk straight into the dark horizon without falling.</p>
<p>To her right, the bright red of the Marriott’s marquis glowed above a few illuminated windows in the tall building.</p>
<p>To her left, Bazine Netal’s home was dark save for one security light shining down on the back deck. Ben, no doubt, was inside asleep. Did Wicket curl up on the foot of his bed at night, or stay in his own bed on the floor? Rey imagined the former.</p>
<p>Rey faced forward again, drawing her legs into a lotus position. Back straight, hands relaxed on her knees, she closed her eyes and began the meditation.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is July fifth, nineteen sixty-eight. I am twenty-five years old. Today I will meet Ben Solo. Ben Solo is twenty-eight years old.</em>
</p>
<p>The Calrissian guide noted that the meditation to manifest need not be long or detailed. Keep the points direct, focus on the goal, and block all surrounding distractions. The early hour and abandoned beach setting helped Rey relax and slip into a trance as the mantra repeated in her mind.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is July fifth, nineteen sixty-eight. I am twenty-five years old. Today I will meet Ben Solo. Ben Solo is twenty-eight years old.</em>
</p>
<p>Her body thrummed; her skin tingled. She’d read to expect that, and focused on her words. She didn’t want the initial excitement to bring her out of the moment.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is July fifth, nineteen sixty-eight. I am twenty-five years old. Today I will meet Ben Solo. Ben Solo is twenty-eight years old.</em>
</p>
<p>Her bones and organs felt lighter, detached, like she was swimming inside herself. Her skin cooled. She couldn’t move if she tried.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is July fifth, nineteen sixty-eight. I am twenty-five years old. Today I will meet Ben Solo. Ben Solo is twenty-eight years old.</em>
</p>
<p>Outside forces fought her now. A seagull shrieked overhead. Muted orange grew brighter behind her eyelids. The waves strengthened, if the rise in volume provided any indication. All served to tap at her senses and bring her back to consciousness. The mantra broke into pieces in her mind and Rey succumbed to the world.</p>
<p>She opened her eyes and the sea was unchanged, only the waves higher and rougher. The air smelled the same.</p>
<p>Then she turned to her right. The Marriott wasn’t there.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>3/17/2021 - A three-chapter update today for flow. Happy St. Patrick's Day.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Friday, July 5, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“Holy shit,” she whispered. <em>Don’t tell me this actually fucking worked!</em></p>
<p>Rey stretched her legs out before her, wiggling her toes to rid herself of the pins and needles sensation. She leaned back with the heels of her hands bracing her, her fingers digging into the sand.</p>
<p>The beach was mostly empty, the only signs of life being the few surfers on longboards paddling out to sea. Longboards, like in the old “beach blanket” films. Perhaps not so old now.</p>
<p>She turned toward Bazine’s house and the differences hit her immediately. The low brick fence bordering the back lawn appeared newer, less eroded. The back deck was gone, and the exterior paint looked fresher. Square in the middle of the grass, a man in a crewcut, Rey guessed him at middle age, sat in a woven lawn chair reading a newspaper.</p>
<p>Definitely not Ben Solo.</p>
<p>Rey tested her legs and feet and stood. She drew her purse strap over her shoulder and walked back up the ramp to where the beach access path met the corner of the brick. “Excuse me,” she called out to the man. “Sir?”</p>
<p>The man wore thick black rims, gray slacks and a white button-down shirt with short sleeves. Straight out of central casting, if the call was for old-timer square. He glared at Rey, clearly irritated by the interruption.</p>
<p>“Sir, I’m looking for a woman named Bazine. I was told this was her house.”</p>
<p>“This is <em>my</em> house,” the man barked. “I don’t know any Baz-een. Shouldn’t you be going to work instead of lollygagging at the beach?”</p>
<p>Rey narrowed her gaze. “Shouldn’t you?”</p>
<p>“I’m retired.” Drew Carey’s evil twin snapped his newspaper and returned his attention to it.</p>
<p>This was how people dressed for retirement in the Sixties. <em>Okay, boomer</em>. Or whatever that generation was called before that period. His surliness bothered her not at all. Rey nearly danced down the street. She’d traveled back fifty fucking years in time!</p>
<p>It was a twenty-block walk to the main boardwalk and the Oceanfront shops and eateries. Rey walked up Atlantic Avenue slowly, using the opportunity to study the early beach area. The giant beach boxes of the twenty-first century hadn’t come yet. Rey marveled at the quaint, flat-roofed cottages with their pastel exteriors and lawn decorations. The number of houses was the same but everything appeared more spread out, likely because the future’s construction had homes on top of each other. Rey saw people sitting on lawns and porches and everybody waved as she passed.</p>
<p>And the cars. Long bodies and fins. Mint green and melon pink paints. Makes that no longer existed in 2018: Plymouth, Oldsmobile. Rey did a double-take while waiting to cross the street as a Studebaker -- <em>a fucking Studebaker wagon</em> -- pulled to a stop at the light.</p>
<p>On instinct, she searched the streets for the Solo Samba and, seeing nothing close to it, crossed quickly before the lights changed.</p>
<p>She put a hand over her face. This was too much to absorb. She had to control her reactions, otherwise people might think she’d just come out of prison after ten years.</p>
<p>Approaching the boardwalk, she noticed the transformation...or regression, in this case. She noted fewer hotels and more large homes in places where hotels would stand in later years. The snack shops that survived into 2018 looked fresher, newly opened. A huge billboard atop a building advertising a popcorn stand blinked in the early morning. Rey had seen photos of it in the museum’s archives, but the kitschiness shone through in person.</p>
<p>Her stomach growled. Time for the money test.</p>
<p>The closest diner was on the ground floor of The Belvedere, one of the oldest hotels on the beach...in her time, anyway. It was a favorite of hers for weekend breakfasts, and thus far was the only place to look close to her 2018 experience. Price was the only difference. Rey took a stool and accepted a cup of coffee from the waitress. She gaped at the menu.</p>
<p>Seventy-five cents for a stack of pancakes. A buck thirty-five for two eggs and two strips of bacon. Fifteen cents for a bottomless cup of coffee. She filled up on pancakes and sausage and watched the waitress as she handed over one of the crisp five-dollar bills with the tiny portrait of Lincoln within his oval frame.</p>
<p>The matronly woman in the tan uniform and white apron barely blinked at it. She rang up Rey’s bill and slapped down her change. Two ones, two Kennedy half dollars, and three dimes.</p>
<p>“Have a good day, sugar.”</p>
<p>“Thanks.” Rey scooped everything but one of the Kennedys into her purse and left. Outside, she pinched her arm. Not a dream. She’d eaten a full breakfast for the price of a tall Starbucks latte. Less than that!</p>
<p>A flicker of paper caught her eye. The wire newspaper rack close to the building was stuffed with local tourist guides, but sandwiched in between the magazines were copies of <em>The Rebellion</em>. She pulled out an older issue, this one dated June tenth. <em><strong>RFK: WHY?</strong></em> read the headline in giant letters.</p>
<p>Underneath Ben’s byline was a thoughtful piece on Robert Kennedy’s assassination and the impact it would have on bringing forward a Democratic candidate willing to end American involvement in Vietnam. Rey knew from her research that despite the Kennedy legacy, Bobby wasn’t exactly ahead in the polls at the time of his death. Ben noted it in his article, and offered tentative support for Eugene McCarthy, the candidate he deemed most vocal about ending the war.</p>
<p>Rey looked up from the newspaper and out into 1968. Come November, Richard Nixon would celebrate his election. Yet, now that she was here…</p>
<p><em>One thing at a time, Rey.</em> She needed to find Ben first. She checked the address of <em>The Rebellion</em> in the masthead and recognized the street. Bad news, it required a longer walk. Rey looked down at her poor choice in footwear and hoped to find a shop along the way for something more practical that wouldn’t take the rest of her money.</p>
<p>She started for the boardwalk when a loud car horn sounded, followed by a wolf whistle and a suggestive remark. The comeback came in a loud, familiar voice.</p>
<p>“Buzz off, you creep!”</p>
<p>Rey saw her standing by a telephone pole, flipping the bird at the driver who had harassed her. A macrame shoulder bag stuff with leaflets sat by her feet, and her other hand clutched a bright red stapler.</p>
<p>Rose Tico was wearing the same beaded halter and denim jean shorts from the museum photograph. Now, in full color, she was attempting to affix one of the small posters to the wooden pole, cursing as the heavy paper folded over and flapped in the wind.</p>
<p>“Need some help?” Rey asked on approach.</p>
<p>Rose flashed her a smile, looking grateful. “Thanks! My sister is supposed to be helping out, but she cut out to go to work.”</p>
<p>After introductions, Rey held the poster still while Rose stapled the corners. She read the advertisement for Ben’s speech before The Who concert. Other speakers and a warm-up band were scheduled to attend as well. “You coming?” Rose asked. “It’s gonna be a blast.”</p>
<p>“I’d like to do more than attend. I want to help.” She nodded at the bag of posters. “You have to put up all of these?”</p>
<p>“Hopefully not. We’ve pretty much wallpapered the city. I keep extra because some square’s always tearing some down.” Rose laughed, and when her gaze fell on the paper in Rey’s hand she added, “What do you think of it?”</p>
<p>“I love it, it’s everything I believe in. It’s why I want to help out. Do you know if <em>The Rebellion</em> is hiring?”</p>
<p>“You mean like money?” Rose scoffed. “No, sis, we don’t do it for the bread. It’s for the cause. Opening eyes. Getting people to see that we have no business in a foreign country when there’s stuff here we have to fix.” Rose grabbed her bag. “What are you doing later, going to work? If not, if you help me check for torn up posters I’ll take you back to meet the boss man.”</p>
<p>Rey’s heart thudded. “It’s a deal.” They shook on it. “I don’t have a job. It’s...kind of a long story.”</p>
<p>“That’s cool,” Rose said. “I’ll drive the long way there and you can lay it on me.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Content notes: smoking</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Inside Rose’s little blue Beetle, Rey spun a fantastic line of bullshit, surprised and pleased to see Rose hang on every word. Much of it, to be sure, was steeped in truth. Rey had grown up parentless for the most part, and bounced around a number of foster homes. She had skills that might benefit <em>The Rebellion</em>, but, “It’s just I have an issue with...uh, paperwork,” she began.</p><p>Here followed a story about fleeing an abusive ex, needing to change her name to Rey Burke, and looking for a place to stay and work, if that was possible in her situation.</p><p>“Say no more,” Rose said as they puttered up and down Pacific Avenue. They were checking for ripped posters. Rose mentioned that with the Fourth bringing in massive crowds, some of the older crowd might have grabbed at them in disgust. Luckily, Rose’s earlier handiwork appeared intact.</p><p>“I got a friend who can help you out. You need an ID, he’ll make you one. And anyway, Ben doesn’t care about references or where you went to school, or if you went,” she said. “If you work out, you’ll stick around. And don’t worry. I won’t tell anybody about all that jazz.”</p><p>Rey nodded. “I appreciate it, Rose. I’m --” She stopped on seeing the purple VW bus parked along the curb of the residential street where Rose turned.</p><p>Rose stopped behind it and jerked the parking brake harder than necessary. “This is Ben’s pad. Well, he lives upstairs,” she said. “<em>The Rebellion</em> takes up the whole first floor. Come on in.”</p><p>Rey exited the Beetle and imprinted on the scene before her. On this street, in 2018, this house no longer existed. In its place, a line of dull white townhomes designed as seasonal rentals had been erected. In 1968, there stood a sunny yellow, two-story beach cottage with a narrow front porch and sloped roof. Two young women sat on the porch swing up front, one smoking a cigarette while the other drank from a glass soda bottle. Both greeted Rose on the way in and eyed Rey with interest.</p><p>“Looks like Rose found another stray,” she heard one remark, deciding whether or not it was said with malice. So the younger Tico had a reputation for recruiting new blood.</p><p>They entered a great room alive with activity. One young blonde manned a phone at a reception desk; an array of anti-war posters decorated the wall behind her. To their left, three more women sat at a long table laden with newspapers, labeling and stamping for mail delivery. Excited chatter filled the space and people milled about, discussing deadlines and asking for help on various tasks.</p><p>Rose asked the blonde if Ben was busy. The receptionist covered the phone’s speaker. “He’s got that awful J.B. Hutt back there with him. Give ‘em five. They’ve been in there a while and should be done soon.”</p><p>Rey’s stomach twinged. This would be the advertiser from Ben’s journal. </p><p>“Thanks, Kaydel.” Rose made a face and guided Rey to the kitchen. She pulled two glass Coke bottles from the fridge, cranked off the tops using a bottle opener nailed to the wall, and offered one to Rey. “I kind of feel bad,” she said. “Ben’s met with a different suit every day this week, trying to get more ad money.” She gestured out to the great room with her bottle. “Meanwhile, everybody here just fools around.”</p><p>Rey pulled hard on her Coke, suppressing a moan. Everything in this year tasted better, too. To be drinking a Coca-Cola before all the formula changes in the Eighties… “It looks like he does a lot of the work,” she said, and held up the copy of <em>The Rebellion</em> she’d found. “I saw where he nearly wrote this entire issue.”</p><p>“He’s brilliant, and he works so hard.” Rose’s expression turned dreamy, indicating a crush. “I tried to write an article myself, but it sucked. I’m not cut out for journalism, just stirring up trouble.”</p><p>“You shouldn’t say that. You’re here. Ben must see something in you to let you hang around.”</p><p>Rose shrugged. “I’m good at stapling posters to walls, and shouting at squares,” she said.</p><p>“Have you thought about bringing in advertising?” Rey asked. “You seem very personable. You got me into your car and I barely know you. Imagine using that power to charm ad money out of a business owner.”</p><p>Rose was dragging long on her Coke as Rey talked. She was about to respond when a large figure filled the doorway to the kitchen. This had to be J.B. Hutt, a large man in a light blue suit and beads of sweat ringing his balding head. “Well, good morning, ladies,” he said, giving each of them an appreciative leer. “Seems everywhere I turn in this building the scenery is quite… delectable.”</p><p>Rey expected another “buzz off, creep” from Rose, and was surprised when the younger woman pushed out a hip and smiled back. “I hope your meeting with Mr. Solo went well,” she said.</p><p>“Quite, quite.” Mr. Hutt seemed fond of that word. He took a linen handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his brow. “I look forward to doing business with the young man, and perhaps his…” his gaze drifted to the pretty flowers gathered in the great room, “staff and little newspaper will benefit me in the long run.”</p><p>Was he referring to boosting his business or libido? Rey thought back to the burning sage remark in Ben’s journal and inhaled a bit to see if he’d actually lit a bundle. Instead she picked up notes of sweat and burnt toast from the kitchen.</p><p>Mr. Hutt lumbered away and Rose pulled her toward the back of the house. “Let’s go say hello to Ben before somebody else grabs him,” she said.</p><p>Rey’s heart pounded wildly through the short hallway walk into a bedroom fashioned into Ben’s main office, packed with tables and equipment. A woman sat at what appeared to be a typesetting machine to the left, clacking away at the keys. A long table at the back held dummy sheets and strips of typed papers -- the components of the next issue, she guessed. Bulletin boards lined the walls, each one covered in clippings, notes, and calendar pages riddled with handwriting. The room smelled heavy of ink and tobacco, and both windows were open to ventilate.</p><p>To the right, leaning on his desk, Ben Solo stood looking down at the check in his hand. The other, with a lit cigarette clamped between his fingers, braced the edge. The wild beating stopped and Rey’s heart plummeted. She’d seen pictures and documentary footage, but it hadn’t prepared her for twenty-eight-year-old Ben Solo in the flesh.</p><p>Unruly dark hair. Ragged moustache. Scruff of beard under the chin. Long, noble profile. Serious eyes. Tall...perhaps more than he’d be at seventy-eight. And Rose had no problem walking up to the man and pressing herself against him.</p><p>Rose broke his concentration. Ben took a drag from his cigarette and flicked the ash on the glass tray on the center of his desk. He brought his arms loosely around the young woman and regarded her like one would scold a child. A twinge of jealousy passed through Rey at the intimate gesture.</p><p>“You done putting up all those posters like I asked?”</p><p>Rose pushed out her lower lip. “Didn’t have to. The old ones were intact,” she said, and directed his attention to Rey. “Someone here to see you. This is Rey Burke and she wants to volunteer.”</p><p>His gaze met hers, and softened. The man smiled and it was all Rey could do to not melt right there. <em>We’re going to be lovers.</em></p><p>He mashed the cigarette in the glass and tucked the check in his back jeans pocket. “Ms. Burke,” he said, sounding as he had fifty years later. “So you’ve joined the legion of Rose’s strays. Welcome.” The way he said it, it didn’t sound as insulting as coming from the woman on the front porch. He nodded at <em>The Rebellion</em> in her hands. “You’re familiar with our style?”</p><p>“Yes. I was telling Rose this morning that I would be interested in writing for you.”</p><p>From behind her came a snorting noise. Rey turned as the woman at the typesetting machine spun in her chair. Rey’s breath caught on sight of the spitting image of Ben’s daughter, now glaring at her.</p><p>“Do you have any newspaper experience?” Ben asked, and Rey faced him again. “It’s not a requirement; then again all positions here are volunteer. I hope Rose made you aware of it.”</p><p>“She did, and that’s fine,” Rey said, smoothing out the copy of <em>The Rebellion</em> in her hands. “To answer your question, I have not written for a newspaper before. My writing experience is mainly from college. Term papers.”</p><p>Ben lifted a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, tapped one out, and pinched it between his lips. “Where’d you go?”</p><p>“Old Dominion.”</p><p>He raised his eyebrows. “So did I. Major?”</p><p>Rey’s heart thudded again. She sensed a quiz coming, and doubted any of her professors had been around in the early-to-mid Sixties. “H-history.”</p><p>“Don’t know many people in that department. I was Journalism.”</p><p>Rey sagged a bit and watched him light the cigarette. She winced at his initial exhalation, though he aimed for the ceiling.</p><p>“Are you working now? What’s your free time like?” he asked. Rey spun a line about being in between jobs and his smile spread a bit wider. “Not unlike the gang out there. Ms. Burke --”</p><p>“Rey.”</p><p>He nodded. “It may look like a loose affiliation of people in that next room, everybody shucking and jiving, but I take this seriously. I assign tasks, I want them completed. I set deadlines, I want them met. Like typesetting the content so I can put this next issue to bed seeing as we’re running late,” he added over Rey’s shoulder. Seconds later the sound of typing filled the room again.</p><p>“It’s a lot to ask of people I’m not paying yet, but as you’re here I’m guessing it’s the cause that drives you,” he added.</p><p>“It is,” Rey said. “Let me prove it. Give me something to do.”</p><p>“Why not give her Wedge Antilles?” This from the woman Rey assumed was Bazine, Senior.</p><p>Rose, who was now fishing in Ben’s pack for her own cig, huffed. “Baz, shove it.” Obviously a sore point in the organization.</p><p>“I’m sorry?” Rey asked.</p><p>“Wedge is a friend from high school. He came home recently, lost his leg.” Ben walked around his desk and sat. “I’d like to interview him for a future issue but he won’t talk to me.” Elbow on his desk, Ben fixated on a curl of smoke streaming from the burning end of his cig. “I’ve sent three other people over to his house to talk, but he turns them away.”</p><p>He flicked his gaze at Rey. “Now you may be thinking, why pursue it if he doesn’t want to talk? Like I said, I knew Wedge. He was so outgoing in school, never met a stranger. Vietnam changed him, and I think people should know that. People should know what this war is doing to people on both sides. We have one here who came home, I can’t ignore that.”</p><p>Rey considered his words. She hadn’t found the issue with Wedge’s interview, and wasn’t certain if one came out, by her or anybody else. A thought occurred to her. “Mr. Solo…”</p><p>“Ben.” He smiled. “We’re rather informal here.”</p><p>His hugging Rose proved that. “These people you sent to see Wedge Antilles...were they all men?” she asked.</p><p>He furrowed his brows. “Actually, yeah.”</p><p>“Does he live alone?”</p><p>“He’s at home with his parents.”</p><p>Rey spotted a rotary phone on his desk. She’d only ever seen one at the antique mall, and she’d practiced on it while shopping for her clothes. She asked Ben for Wedge’s number and to borrow the phone.</p><p>The typing stopped again. Rey paused at the corner of Ben’s desk looking at the strip of paper he’d given her. Lynnhaven-2315. An old name exchange, even in this year. This style of phone number had phased out in the Sixties, but it appeared some parts of the city clung to them.</p><p>Another test to pass. Rey held the receiver to her ear and dialed. <em>Don’t dial the area code</em>, she reminded herself. LYN...596. She looked up to all eyes on her and waited for somebody to answer.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As the phone rang, Rey covered the speaker with her hand and asked Ben, “What’s his mother’s name?”</p>
<p>“Zena.”</p>
<p>She nodded. “May I speak with Zena Antilles, please?” she asked when a voice answered. “Mrs. Antilles, my name is Rey Burke and I’m a reporter with <em>The Rebellion</em>. I was hoping to speak with you if you have a few minutes.”</p>
<p>A heavy sigh roared in her ear. “Ms. Burke, I appreciate your interest, but Ben must know by now my son is not interested in talking to anybody.”</p>
<p>“Mrs. Antilles, I am calling to speak with you,” she said. Now, Bazine had come over to the desk to stand with Rose. “I would like to interview you personally for an upcoming issue.”</p>
<p>“Me? What for?” The woman, thankfully, sounded more curious than reluctant.</p>
<p>Rey steeled herself. <em>Let this work.</em> “Mrs. Antilles, I’m not sure how familiar you are with <em>The Rebellion</em>. Much of the content focuses on our men at war and issues here at home. One thing we really haven’t covered is the perspective of other people affected, namely mothers.” She hoped that was the case.</p>
<p>Zena Antilles was quiet, breathing low.</p>
<p>“I understand your son returned home from his tour of duty with a disability. I’m sorry to hear it,” Rey said. “I imagine you are relieved he came home alive, however, and I believe our readers would love to know your story in particular. Everything you thought and experienced while your son was away and how you feel now that he’s home. Would you be willing to share with us?”</p>
<p>Her palms turned cold and damp holding the receiver. Ben stared at her, with what Rey perceived as awe.</p>
<p>Zena agreed to give an interview. Rey set an appointment for tomorrow morning at ten. “One more thing,” she said before ringing off, “does Wedge have a favorite candy? Necco Wafers. Thank you very much. I will see you tomorrow.”</p>
<p>She replaced the receiver with a trembling hand. For a moment, nobody said a word. Ben took a drag and exhaled, watching her as though trying to figure out the method to her madness. Bazine broke the silence.</p>
<p>“You were supposed to get an interview with Wedge.”</p>
<p>“Baz,” Ben snapped at her, then nodded at Rey. “That was a clever move,” he told Rey. “Remind me never to challenge you to chess.”</p>
<p>She smiled. “My thinking is, why would Wedge cooperate with a male reporter? There’s a chance he might resent a man who wasn’t drafted. Like you.”</p>
<p>Bazine and Rose reared back at that. Ben didn’t react.</p>
<p>“You have a point,” he said. “I’ve gotten by on college deferments. Granted, I wanted to go to school. So, you’re going to use Zena to get to her son?”</p>
<p>“I’m going to interview Zena. If Wedge wants to contribute, that’s up to him.”</p>
<p>Bazine made a face at her. “That’s not what Ben asked for.”</p>
<p>Ben ignored the other woman this time. He stood and walked over to the bulletin board holding the calendar. He pressed his fingers on the fifteenth square. “Most of this issue is complete, plus we have to shift things around to accommodate the new ad for Hutt’s Party Rentals,” he said. He asked for a pen and wrote Wedge’s name under the twenty-second. “I’ll need twelve inches of copy by the sixteenth,” he told Rey.</p>
<p>Ben spoke in newspaper terms. Rey wasn’t certain how many words equated to twelve inches, so she’d write long; that way he could easily cut passages if necessary. “You got it.”</p>
<p>He leaned against the wall, bringing the cigarette to his lips again. How many of those did he smoke in a day? “In the meantime, could you give me something shorter by this coming Tuesday, like five? We have enough space for an editorial, and you seem full of ideas.”</p>
<p>“Of course,” she said.</p>
<p>Ben held out his hand and they shook. An electric charge surged up Rey’s arm into her heart.</p>
<p>“Welcome to <em>The Rebellion</em>, Rey Burke.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>With nowhere to go after the meeting, very little money, and no possessions, Rey asked Rose for help. Her new friend immediately invited her to stay at the home she shared with her sister Paige and two other women, one of whom was Kaydel the receptionist. “We each have our own room, so you can bunk with me until you figure it out.”</p>
<p>Rose lived two blocks away in a one-floor bungalow with very little front lawn. She parked her Beetle on the driveway and gave Rey a quick tour. “We take turns making dinner, so I’ll get you on the schedule. Oh, and I should call Poe to come over and get your ID straightened out.” The house had one phone, sitting on an occasional table in the front hall. A very long cord connecting it to the jack at the baseboard allowed users to carry the device deep into the living room, which is what Rose did.</p>
<p>“Thanks.” Rey hoped she’d be able to get a job somewhere and contribute more to the household. “You sure your roommates won’t mind?”</p>
<p>The rotary phone snicked and swooshed with every number number dialed. “Nah,” Rose said. “People come and go all the time here. Long as the rent gets paid.”</p>
<p>Rey watched for the cord as she surveyed the living room, while Rose gabbed. Furniture typical for the period, all seating pointed toward a boxy RCA television encased in a wooden cabinet. The tube screen was small and almost oval-shaped, and Rey bent close to study the channel and volume dials. Such a primitive object, yet to Rose it was probably a luxury.</p>
<p>Rose hung up and bounded near, nudging Rey to one side and turning it on. “It’s color,” she said, “and it’s time for my stories. Want a sandwich?”</p>
<p>They sat on the carpet, dining on PBJs and Cokes and watching soaps. It sparked memories of Rey watching <em>Days of Our Lives</em> with one of her foster parents over a summer, though rather than pay attention to the plots she borrowed a pencil and paper and worked on the editorial Ben had requested. She wished she had read the one with her byline a bit closer while she sat in her office at The Naboo Gallery. It was on homelessness, so she pieced together what words she did recall and worked around them.</p>
<p>Thirty minutes later, when the closing credits rolled over the famed hourglass of the soap, Rey had just over two hundred words down. Rose leaned over for a look. “That’s pretty good,” she said. “You really did go to college, huh?”</p>
<p>“Yeah. Why do you ask?”</p>
<p>Rose shrugged. “I should go myself, but I was never that bright.”</p>
<p>“That’s not an excuse, Rose. You don’t have to be Einstein. It’s why you go to college, to learn.”</p>
<p>Rose took their plates and walked into the kitchen. “I don’t know what I’d study, anyway,” she said, coming back. “Paige didn’t go to college, and she works the front office for an insurance agent. Says it’s a drag, but she’s learning stuff. Some day she’ll become an agent, too.”</p>
<p>She flopped on the couch as <em>The Doctors</em> came on. “It’s not what I want to do, either. My only other choice is to marry a man with a good job, but they’re in short supply right now. Too old or too square.”</p>
<p>“You seem rather passionate about causes. Maybe if you get into school you could do social work,” Rey said. “Be a counselor, help people like you’re helping me.”</p>
<p>Rose’s expression softened. Before she could answer, the front door opened to reveal the one of the men Rey had seen in Rose’s protest photo. Shaggy dark hair, unbuttoned shirt, brilliant smile. The man Rose had called Poe.</p>
<p>Behind him, another familiar face.</p>
<p>“You, out!” Rose leaped from the couch and stomped over to clean-cut Armitage Hux. “Paige says no dogs in the house.”</p>
<p>“Relax, I’m not staying.” Armitage kept his arms out to hold Rose at length. “Poe told me he was helping out a new victim of yours. It would be remiss of me to not deliver a warning.” He trained his gaze on Rey as he said this. “I'm Armitage Hux, and here it is,” he said, a long finger pointed at Rose. “She’s a delinquent. Get out while you can.”</p>
<p>Rose leaned in as though to bite him, and he pulled away. “You need me to wait in the truck?” he asked Poe.</p>
<p>Poe was checking the camera he’d brought. “Go on. I’ll hitch a ride back with somebody.”</p>
<p>Armitage threw a leering parting shot at them and slammed the door. Rose slapped her friend’s shoulder. “Why do you hang out with him?”</p>
<p>“He has wheels. I don’t.”</p>
<p>“Ben has wheels.”</p>
<p>“Ben has work to do, and I’m avoiding him right now because I owe him work. Instead I’m doing this,” Poe said. He looked up and smiled at Rey as Rose made introductions. “You got a boyfriend, girlie girl?”</p>
<p><em>I’m not here for you.</em> “A prospect or two. How much will this cost me?” Rey counted her life savings in her head.</p>
<p>“Don’t worry about it. I owe Rose as well. This makes us even.” Poe had Rey stand against a bare wall and took a few snapshots. Rose suggested multiple pictures so Ben could have one for Rey’s first column in <em>The Rebellion</em>.</p>
<p>“Oh yeah?” Poe brightened even more. “That’s an incentive to catch up on what Ben wants from me. Whatcha writing about? I know a handsome photographer willing to give an interview.”</p>
<p>“I finished my piece today. Look, I’m hoping to find a job soon, so...?”</p>
<p>“I’ll have it in a few days. I’ll use this address on the ID and come by here or Ben’s when it’s ready. Or maybe we can meet up for a burger or something,” Poe said with a wink. He hugged Rose on the way out, his hand lingering a bit on her bottom. Classy.</p>
<p>“Is he your boyfriend?” Rey asked, to make conversation.</p>
<p>Rose shook her head. “Poe’s all right, I guess. Not really my type. He takes pictures for everybody in town, wants to be a big-time photojournalist and travel the world.” She sat back on the couch. “I rather like the beach here. If I choose to marry, he should be cool.”</p>
<p>“And that other guy isn’t cool? What's his name, Armitage?”</p>
<p>Rose gave her a look like she prepared to gag. “He is the biggest drip in the state. The world! He volunteered for Nixon’s campaign!” The girl shuddered. “Ugh, no way.”</p>
<p>Old Ben’s tease about Armitage being Rose’s “boyfriend” surfaced in her mind. Rey decided to let it go. For now.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. In 1968, Days of Our Lives was a half-hour soap. It extended to a full hour a few years later.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Ben sat on his front steps, barefoot and still in the day’s clothes, ever present cigarette in one hand. Rey spotted the remnants of a TV dinner in its sectional foil tray next to him. He was staring ahead into space, or quiet contemplation, and at first Rey was tempted to turn around and not disturb him. Yet it was a challenge to look away; he struck a weary yet honorable profile, relaxing after a long day.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After five, the rest of the motley family drifted in for dinner. Rey had met Kaydel at <em>The Rebellion</em> offices and enjoyed making further acquaintance with her while Rose boiled water for spaghetti. When not giving time at Ben’s reception desk, she worked at her parents’ ice cream shop on the Oceanfront.</p>
<p>Jannah, bursting through the door at five-thirty in a yellow sleeveless minidress, welcomed Rey with a smile and gave apologies. She’d come from her job as a switchboard operator and was late preparing for a date. She ran into her room to freshen up.</p>
<p>“Her boyfriend Finn is so cool,” Rose told her. “He wants to join the Black Panthers.” Rey wondered if he was the other man in Rose’s protest photo.</p>
<p>Last to arrive home was Paige, weary in a pantsuit that flowed like her long hair. She was warm with Rey and not surprised when she learned Rose would be hosting her. “Whatever your story is, I hope everything works out,” she said. She one-arm hugged Rose. “I keep telling Rose she should open an orphanage for grown-ups.”</p>
<p>She went to her room to change. Rey rather liked this version of Paige, as opposed to the colder one she’d encountered at the museum.</p>
<p>After dinner, it was still light out, and Paige was done for the week. She wanted to have a beer and watch television until she conked. Summer television provided reruns and a late evening movie on CBS, <em>I Want To Live!</em> with Susan Hayward. The roommates gathered around the set, their evening planned.</p>
<p>Rey, however, had an itch. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to go for a walk. I need to pick up those Necco Wafers for Wedge Antilles tomorrow.”</p>
<p>Paige suggested she try Maz’s Corner Store and gave directions. Rose stuck out her tongue in disgust. “Neccos are gross,” she said. “Get him some Life Savers.”</p>
<p>Paige fished around in her purse and held up a dollar. “Could you get me a few packs of Salem Lights while you’re out?” Rey obliged, and asked if anybody had an envelope. “Check that drawer,” Paige said, pointing her can toward a desk by the living room wall.</p>
<p>Rey wrote Ben’s name on the front and folded in her editorial. Rose told her to come straight to her room if she got in late, and she’d set up sleeping arrangements.</p>
<p>Walking familiar yet new-to-her territory in the twilight, Rey was struck by the quiet. Traffic was lighter, despite the peak summer season, and more people were out on their porches than inside watching TV. Children played in the streets, kicking balls and attempting to tag one another. She walked past one group splashing in a kiddie pool and waved.</p>
<p>It seemed like such a simpler time, but 1968 had as many issues as 2018. Rey guessed constant exposure via social media and 24/7 news gave her present hardships more weight.</p>
<p>At Maz’s store she found everything she needed, plus a pack of plain and peanut M&amp;M’s for herself. On a rack by the register were several pairs of sunglasses. Rey spotted the pair she wore in the photo with Ben. <em>Bingo</em>. She added it to her purchases and set them on her head.</p>
<p>Rey detoured home by way of Ben’s street and noticed the van was parked facing the opposite direction from earlier. All the lights were on, and music streamed from the open front door. John Fogerty sang his love song to Suzie Q, backed by the rest of Creedence.</p>
<p>Ben sat on his front steps, barefoot and still in the day’s clothes, ever present cigarette in one hand. Rey spotted the remnants of a TV dinner in its sectional foil tray next to him. He was staring ahead into space, or quiet contemplation, and at first Rey was tempted to turn around and not disturb him. Yet it was a challenge to look away; he struck a weary yet honorable profile, relaxing after a long day. The last thing she wanted was to pile on more work for him.</p>
<p>She took two steps back and scraped against a rock. The noise brought Ben’s attention to her. “Rey the stray,” he called to her. “What do you say?”</p>
<p>“Hey?” Best she could manage, being this nervous. It got a laugh from Ben, though, and he beckoned her closer. “Looks like it’s going to be a beautiful night,” she said, looking up into the darkening sky. “I didn’t feel like staying inside.”</p>
<p>“Same here. I finally got next week’s issue to press,” Ben said. “Now I can focus on the one after that.”</p>
<p>Rey looked into the house. “Are you alone?”</p>
<p>“Yeah.” Ben stabbed his cigarette into the tray. “Everybody leaves at five. That’s the first rule. It’s not fair for me to keep people late if I can’t pay,” he said. “That won’t be the model forever, though. Once I get more ad revenue I'll be able to compensate everybody, and maybe they won’t have to sing on the streets for donations anymore.”</p>
<p>Rey expected to see Bazine somewhere in there, coming out with a drink and glaring at her. “I imagine some wouldn’t mind staying longer to work, money or no.”</p>
<p>“I appreciate their dedication, but they have lives, too. Live it while you can, especially now.”</p>
<p>“I see.” She saw Ben wasn’t looking at her. Message received; she’d try another time when he was more receptive. “I should go then.”</p>
<p>Ben dismissed the idea. “No, come hang a bit if you like. Want a beer?”</p>
<p>“Sure.”</p>
<p>He invited her to sit, then took his tray inside. In the background, Creedence faded into silence, then a loud click sounded. Rey turned back to see Ben had set up his stereo speakers at the open windows. In between, visible from the door, was a record player with a stacker. The next record automatically dropped on the previous one. She recognized the first song, “Gloria.”</p>
<p>Ben returned with two open cans and sat next to her. “I love this song,” she said.</p>
<p>“I love the whole album. That’s actually my second copy. Wore the first one out.” Ben stretched out his long legs, crossing them at the ankles. “I don’t know if we’ll get any more from them. I heard one of the members quit the band and fled to Canada.”</p>
<p>“What a drag,” Rey said, imitating Rose. These days, young men moved to Canada for one reason.</p>
<p>A longer period of quiet passed as they drank, and Rey noticed Ben unbuttoning his shirt all the way. Why blame him? July at the beach brought the heat, even at night, but what Ben probably viewed as an act of self-preservation was causing Rey’s body to thrum.</p>
<p>Ben pulled the tails of his shirt out from his jeans and flapped them a bit to create air. Rey may have survived the moment had he not followed it by dragging his dewy beer can across his neck and down his chest a bit to cool off. She took a long pull from her can, though beer wasn’t her favorite, and fought back a belch.</p>
<p>“What is that you’re wearing?” she asked, pointing to the small pewter medal now more prominent around his neck. The same one from the photo.</p>
<p>Ben pressed it between his forefinger and thumb. “It’s called a Miraculous Medal. It was given to me by a nun in Baltimore when I was up there for a protest.” He held the front of it out for her to see better. “That’s the Virgin Mary. The words around her are in Latin. ‘Oh Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.’”</p>
<p>“Are you Catholic? Or raised it?”</p>
<p>Ben shook his head. “I like the idea of this, though. Mary as a mother, holding out her arms to everyone. It’s a gesture of love, isn’t it?” he asked, smiling at her. “The world needs more of it.”</p>
<p>“I imagine if more mothers were in charge of things, this war wouldn’t have started in the first place.”</p>
<p>“Right on,” Ben said. He set down his beer and turned his body toward her. It was probably uncomfortable to recline the way he did, but it gave Rey a nicer view she wouldn’t refuse. “I suppose Wedge’s mother is like that. She was always nice to everybody when we went over. She’d go out of her way to make sure you were fed and welcome. She’s not a political person, or vocal,” he added. “I can’t tell you what to expect from her tomorrow.”</p>
<p>“Perhaps she’s not been political because nobody’s talked to her directly about the war, or related issues,” Rey said. “Perhaps she’s had something to say for years, and thinks she has to wait for permission. I’m not giving it to her; I intend to let her know she can speak any time.”</p>
<p>Another beat of silence passed. The energy spiked between them, with his gaze growing in intensity and interest. “You’re right,” he said finally. “The whole purpose of this newspaper is to change all minds, not just the ones in our age demographic. We have to reach the mothers, too. The grandmothers.” He took on a faraway look with those words. “Maybe this interview will help.”</p>
<p>Rey’s envelope was on the step with her store purchases. “I came by originally to give you this,” she said. “I was going to slip it under the door or something.”</p>
<p>Ben read Rey’s short editorial, no expression on his face. After two or three painfully silent minutes he looked up at her. “This is great.”</p>
<p>“Thanks.”</p>
<p>Ben glanced at his wristwatch. “I planned to head out to Eisley’s later to catch some music, but I’d like to get this typeset and pasted,” he said and got up to retreat into the house. “Thanks for turning this around so quickly. Can’t wait to see what you do with Mrs. Antilles.”</p>
<p>Was this a goodnight? Rey wasn’t quite ready to go back to Rose and Susan Hayward. “Uh, Ben,” she said, rising from the steps. “Do you mind if I watch a bit? I’ve never used a typesetter, maybe I could learn in case you need extra help?”</p>
<p>Ben paused in the doorway, looking down at his feet so as not to budge the record player. “It kind of goes against my rule of people working late here.” It wasn’t said sternly, however.</p>
<p>“Technically, I haven’t worked for you very long,” Rey said. “And it’s not so much work as it is an orientation.” She pulled out one of the M&amp;M packs. “We can split these.”</p>
<p>Ben nodded, considering her point. “I do like the peanut ones. Okay, come on back.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>This instance of "Gloria" is the Shadows of Knight version.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Chapter 11</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>3/23/21: I appreciate all the comments thus far. Happy to announce I have crossed the finish line, so updates may come more frequently depending on how quickly I can edit. :-)</p>
<p>cw // mention of drugs, mention of the Manson killings</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The machine Ben used for <em>The Rebellion</em> didn’t take up floor to ceiling space like the linotype machines of yore, but it was sizable. To Rey it resembled a computer out of a Fifties or Sixties sci-fi film. It had a typewriter-style keyboard but no monitor to see work, and the paper spit out of its boxy side, the ink warm and pungent. She learned that Ben had acquired it cheaply -- much of the tools of his trade, in fact -- from a publication in D.C. that upgraded their equipment.</p>
<p>Ben advised her that to use it correctly, one had to be a perfect typist. No spelling errors or else you had to retype entire paragraphs. Also, you never touched the print as it was still drying when it came out of the machine.</p>
<p>Ben typed up Rey’s column with minimal effort while she sat in a chair next to him and soaked in the moment. Her gaze never left his hands. Long fingers stained with ink and tobacco nimbly covered the keys. His nails were stubby and ragged, but she supposed the cause left him little time for manicures. Still, she watched his hands and fantasized about them doing more than transcribing her work.</p>
<p>The editorial completed, he took the printout and asked Rey to fetch a pair of scissors. “This is the fun part, I’ll let you do it,” he offered. Ben instructed her to clip the article out of the paper and showed her how to run the paper strip through a hot-melt adhesive machine. The rolling device extruded hot glue onto the back side of the column, allowing Ben to affix it to a dummy sheet being used to mock up the July fifteenth issue.</p>
<p>Rey looked at her byline, a sense of pride surging through her. “I should tell you Rose’s friend Poe came by her house to take a picture of me,” she said. “If you need one for the paper.”</p>
<p>“Yeah? I’ll call him myself, thanks.” Ben brought his arm around her, cupping her shoulder and hugging her to his side. “You did good, Rey the stray.”</p>
<p>Rey fought to keep from melting completely into him. Too soon, she decided, but she wasn’t ready for the visit to end. “You said your first rule is nobody works late. If I’m going to write more, maybe you ought to tell me the rest?” she asked. “Better to know now than learn as I go.”</p>
<p>Ben leaned on the corner of his desk, patting his pockets. Looking for his cigs, no doubt. Rey had seen the red and white pack on the steps but said nothing. Putting off one more didn’t stand to kill him. Eventually he turned his attention back to her when she offered him the open bag of candy and spilled a few M&amp;Ms into his palm.</p>
<p>“There’s really one other rule, no drugs on the premises,” he said. “If you want to toke or drop acid or whatever, that’s fine. Do it on your own time anywhere but in this house.” Ben pointed at the floor. “Cops love to stop by unannounced and poke around. They don’t like what I write, but they can’t shut me down unless the law is being broken here.”</p>
<p>“Got it. I’m not much into dope anyway,” Rey said. “What about you?”</p>
<p>“I smoke it in the van, when I need to mellow out.” Ben looked a bit on edge at the moment. Nicotine withdrawal, she guessed. Maybe the candy would help.</p>
<p>“You need to mellow out now?”</p>
<p>“I’ll live,” he said, his voice soft. “I have to. Somebody has to pick up the paper Sunday.”</p>
<p>Rey took the fade in his voice as her cue to say goodnight. “I’d like to help out with that, too, if you need it.”</p>
<p>“More hands the better. Be here around nine Sunday and we’ll drive up. Of course,” he said, moving closer, “if you want to drop in after the interview tomorrow I’m happy to help you through your notes.”</p>
<p>“I’ll hold you to that,” she said, and they parted smiling. Rey walked on air all the way back to Rose’s house.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rose had rolled out a thick foam rubber slab used in the past for camping out at the state park. She plied Rey with blankets and gave her an oversized shirt for sleeping. “I got other tops you can borrow until you can get some more clothes,” she said, settling into her own twin bed.</p>
<p>“Thanks.” Rose had the smallest room in the house, and did little to maximize the space. It was cluttered with novels and magazines. For somebody with little ambition toward education, Rose loved to read.</p>
<p>“Man, you really walked away from your ex with nothing, huh?” Rose asked. She reclined on her side, her face illuminated in the pink shade of her bedside lamp. “We have to go shopping.”</p>
<p>“How about after I go see Mrs. Antilles?” She required the basics. Toiletries, at least one change of clothes, something for when she got her period. Hopefully it all wouldn’t set her back much. She hoped Poe would come through early on the ID, too.</p>
<p>Rey sat up in her makeshift bed, eyeing the hardcover book by the lamp. Rose had a bookmark halfway through Jacqueline Susann’s <em>Valley of the Dolls</em>. “Is that any good? I still haven’t read it.”</p>
<p>“Are you kidding?” Rose’s eyes widened. “It’s the best book ever written. I’ve already read it twice. You can borrow it if you want.” She lurched forward in her head, turning on her stomach to better chat with Rey. “You’ve at least seen the movie, right?”</p>
<p>“Oh, of course.” Parts of it, anyway.</p>
<p>“I’ve seen that at least five times, though the book’s got more story to it.” Rose’s expression turned dreamy. “Paige thought it stunk, but I liked it a lot. Especially Sharon Tate. She’s <em>soooo</em> gorgeous.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.” And the poor woman would be dead in a little over a year, thanks to the Manson family. Rey lay down and stared at the ceiling, thinking of all the tragedies she knew would occur in what had now become the future. Were any of them preventable due to her presence? Would Sharon Tate heed a warning sent to her to get out of Los Angeles during August of next year?</p>
<p>She yawned. She had to sort out her own life before changing the world for the better, if indeed such meddling guaranteed that. Before she completely drifted away, though, she asked Rose, “So, about Ben Solo…”</p>
<p>“Yesssss.” Rose dragged out the word.</p>
<p>“Is he single? I mean, unattached?”</p>
<p>Rose rolled onto her back. “He’s a real dish, isn’t he? Too old for me, sadly. He said so.” She sat up, hugging her pillow. “I’ve seen him date around, but if you ask me his first love is <em>The Rebellion</em>. It’s probably why the office is full of girls. They all want to be close to him, and that’s the best way to do it.”</p>
<p>“That girl at the typesetting machine this morning...she seemed kind of predatory.”</p>
<p>Rose snorted. “Bazine? Yeah, she’d love to sink her claws in him. I don’t think Ben digs her, though. They’d have already done it otherwise.”</p>
<p>“Ah, and you know?”</p>
<p>Rose lifted her arms and gave her a smile of supremacy. “I know everything that goes on in this town.”</p>
<p>“I see. Well, goodnight, Rose. Thanks for helping me out.”</p>
<p>Lights out, but Rey’s eyes stayed open a while. Ben in the future had admitted to never loving Bazine...so why marry her? Unless he’d gotten her pregnant first, and did the honorable thing.</p>
<p>His first love was <em>The Rebellion</em>, and the cause. To win his heart, they would have to be hers as well.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. Without giving away my age, I wanted to note that the typesetting machine here is similar to what I used in high school journalism classes; going off memory here. Google provides some pictures to give you an idea.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Chapter 12</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>cw // talk of the war, implied PTSD on Wedge's part, "slut shaming" on Bazine's part</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Saturday, July 6, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The Antilles family lived further down the beach in the North End neighborhood. In Rey’s time this was the more affluent area, with many of the quaint cottages of old razed in favor of boxy, colorless designs. It pleased Rey to experience a beach town as it should look, eclectic and welcoming and awash in bright color.</p>
<p>The address Ben gave her was a white one-story with a concrete exterior and dark brown trim. The carport on the left was empty but for a few bicycles leaning on a support pole. At the far right, Rey noticed the screened-in sunroom surrounded by jalousie windows. A shadowed figure sat inside, staring out into the street. The chair had wheels.</p>
<p>Rey wore a white peasant-style blouse over her jeans. Rose had said it was her nicest shirt, the best to make an impression today. She sat in Rose’s Beetle and waited for her friend to kill the engine. “You don’t have to stay,” she said. “I can call in an hour or whenever I’m ready to leave.”</p>
<p>“Who knows where I’ll be in an hour,” Rose said. “It’s cool. Syal’s a friend of mine; if she’s home I’ll hang with her.” Syal was Wedge’s younger sister, close to Rose's age.</p>
<p>Turned out, the sister was home watching Saturday morning cartoons and eating cereal straight from the box. Rose sat with her while Rey joined Zena in the kitchen, the woman’s presumed safe space, with her pad and pencil. Rey watched Zena prepare a lasagna from scratch, starting with the flour and eggs for the noodles.</p>
<p>“Let’s start with your thoughts when Wedge was first called up,” Rey began, poised to write. “You find out your oldest child is about to be sent overseas to fight...how did you react?”</p>
<p>Zena was rolling pasta dough into a tight ball. She punched it with her fist -- an impactful image. Rey wished for a camera to accompany the piece. “How would you expect?” Zena replied. “That was one of the worst days of my life. You’re torn between wanting to hold your only son so tight, and leaving the room because you can’t bear to look at his face...because you keep picturing him lying in his casket.”</p>
<p>Rey let the woman talk, and scribbled furiously on her pad. She’d come prepared with questions to ask, but as the one-sided interview progressed she found it easier to interject with prompts. Zena Antilles had so much to say, and her opinions seemed to align with Ben’s and others opposing the war.</p>
<p>The hour passed quickly, and Zena’s lasagna was prepped and ready to bake. “I’m taking this to some friends, the Mothmas,” she explained as she put it in the oven. “She just had a baby. We’re all pitching in while she’s on bedrest.”</p>
<p>How wild was this? Rey knew her boss at the museum was born here...and this would be about the right time for Mon’s age. “It’s wonderful that new life still happens,” she said, and turned her pad to a fresh page. “If he doesn’t mind, I would like to meet Wedge and spend a few minutes with him.”</p>
<p>Zena wiped her hands on a kitchen towel. “I’m happy to introduce you. He hasn’t been much of a conversationalist lately, so you know.”</p>
<p>Rey was fine with that, and she followed Zena through the house toward the back sunroom. Rose and Syal had disappeared, but Rey heard music and voices coming from a bedroom she passed.</p>
<p>Wedge sat alone, smoking a cigarette and watching the activity on the street. He did acknowledge Rey with a nod and short smile as she took the lounger next to him. Zena announced she had chores to finish and left the two alone.</p>
<p>“Thank you for your service,” Rey said. She’d taken to saying it every time she met anyone in the military. Wedge huffed out a short laugh. It clearly meant something different in this time.</p>
<p>Rey took both packs of Necco Wafers from her back pocket and placed one on the table between them; he took it. “Your mother told me these are your favorite. They were my dad’s as well,” she said. Technically a foster dad, but she wanted the story to work. “He bought these by the case, credited them with helping him to quit smoking when his lungs got bad.</p>
<p>“Anyway,” Rey fiddled with the pack in her hand, tearing it open at one end, “he always told me there was one specific way to eat these. What he would do was open the entire pack at once...”</p>
<p>A few of the wafers at the exposed end were broken. They crumbled as Rey spilled the contents of the roll onto the table. She brushed the damaged ones out of the way. “He arranged them by color,” she continued, and demonstrated until she had several stacks of green, yellow, pink...all the flavors. “After dinner, he’d read the paper and eat every last one. Starting in alphabetical order. One chocolate, one cinnamon, one clove. All the way to wintergreen and back again, until they were gone.”</p>
<p>To her point, she reached for one of the brown wafers and popped it in her mouth. Tasted vaguely like chocolate to her, but she wasn’t keen on Neccos. Wedge watched her silently through the whole soliloquy, then glanced over at the neat little candy piles.</p>
<p>Finally, he said, “Your dad was wrong.”</p>
<p>“Come again?”</p>
<p>He nodded toward her candy. “If you’re going through the trouble of sorting them like that, it’s best to eat one flavor at a time,” he said. “Personally, I’d go for either the licorice or clove first. They’re the strongest, so get them out of the way. Move on to wintergreen and cinnamon as a palate cleanser, then the fruit flavors. Save chocolate for last.”</p>
<p>“Why is chocolate last?”</p>
<p>Wedge quirked up his lip in a half-smile. “It’s the best one.”</p>
<p>“That so?” Rey smiled at him, happy to get a wider one back. “You said if. That’s not how you eat them, I take it?”</p>
<p>Wedge held up his roll and cut through the wax paper with his fingernail. “I just pop ‘em in one by one, in the order they come, as the good Lord intended,” he said, and did just that with a yellow wafer. “Usually it’s because I’m on the go and don’t have space to spread out. Well, now…” he gestured to his chair.</p>
<p><em>Here we go.</em> Her next test in this time period. Rey leaned forward in her chair, turning her pencil in her hand. “Is it correct of me to say Neccos were hard to find in Vietnam?”</p>
<p>“Damn near impossible for me,” he said. “Syal told me she sent care packages but I only ever got one. The wafers were near dust by the time they arrived, which was fine. I mixed it in with the water so it would taste better.”</p>
<p>Rey kept her gaze fixed to his. “Can I ask you a few more questions?”</p>
<p>“What do you want to know?”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Goodbyes were said, and a promise was extracted from Rey to join the Antilles family for a Sunday dinner, if not tomorrow then next week. Rose as well. Rose then drove her back to Ben’s, where business conducted as usual with a bevy of young women taking calls and prepping mailers.</p>
<p>Rose peeled off to join the crew, while Rey found Ben in his office and handed him her legal pad of notes. Bazine sat at the typesetting machine, as though she’d never left it.</p>
<p>Ben flipped through the first two pages, filled with pencil. “Mrs. Antilles had quite a bit to say, I gather.”</p>
<p>“Actually,” Rey lifted some of the pages for him and showed him a specific notation, “this is where the notes for my interview with Wedge begin.”</p>
<p>“Son of a gun. You did it, Rey the stray.” Ben grabbed her hand for a hard shake. It surprised her for a second, but Rey quickly recovered and squeezed just as tightly. She longed for Ben to pull her into an embrace, as he’d done with Rose the other day. She wanted that familiarity and comfort with each other to happen soon.</p>
<p>With Bazine now separated from her typing and hovering close, however, today seemed unlikely.</p>
<p>The other woman peered by Ben’s shoulder at Rey’s handwriting. “So...it’s like what Ben said. You used Wedge’s mother to get to him,” she said.</p>
<p>“I interviewed two people today,” Rey said. Wasn’t Bazine the one complaining that she was going about the assignment wrong? Now that Rey had Wedge’s interview she continued to gripe. She focused on Ben. “There’s enough here for two issues, Ben. My thought is run Zena’s first and promote it as a series, then Wedge’s the following week. I don’t have a camera, but I was thinking if Poe or somebody else could--”</p>
<p>“While you’re at it, why don’t you plan out the newspaper for the rest of the month?” Bazine cut in.</p>
<p>“Baz, please,” Ben said. He winced, as though tired of her voice.</p>
<p>“I’m not trying to take over anybody’s job. I was asked to get an interview and I did,” Rey said. “I can’t understand why this upsets you, unless you had attempted one and failed.”</p>
<p>Wrong thing to say. Bazine’s gaze turned cold and Rey felt the chill despite not being touched. “How do we even know Wedge talked to you?”</p>
<p>“Baz,” Ben said in warning, but the other woman had claws out and was intent on marking her so-called territory.</p>
<p>“Ask his mother,” Rey said. “Ask Rose.”</p>
<p>Bazine ignored her. “If she made all this up you could get sued, Ben.”</p>
<p>“Call Mrs. Antilles,” Rey challenged her.</p>
<p>Bazine shot her a look of disgust. “Wedge doesn’t talk to his friends anymore, why open up to a stranger? You probably balled him.”</p>
<p>Ben slapped the pad on his desk, tipping over his ashtray and spilling butts and residue on his desk. “Baz, OUT!” He pointed at the open door. Rey’s heart thudded at this sudden turn of temper.</p>
<p>Bazine looked at him with contrition. She reached for Ben’s arm but he shrugged away, clearly firm in his decision. Chastened, Bazine slinked away, saying she’d come back when Ben cooled down.</p>
<p>“No, you stay out until you’re ready to apologize to Rey.” And he slammed his door, leaving Rey alone with him. Judging from Ben’s reaction, Rey imagined she’d have to wait a while.</p>
<p>She stood back as Ben paced the room for a turn, and leaned on the layout table, breathing deeply to come down. After about a minute he turned to her with a calmer expression. “I’m sorry you saw that,” he said. “I don’t normally lose control. It takes a lot to push my buttons, and Bazine...well, she knows all of them.”</p>
<p>“I should apologize first. I needled her about the interview, too.”</p>
<p>“But you didn’t start a fight. You were only doing a job,” Ben said, and picked up the legal pad and wiped off the ash. “Baz has no interest in writing, though she claims she wants to be involved.” He huffed out a laugh. “Hell, I know why she’s here. I’m supposed to be flattered, I guess. You’d think she’d at least pretend to care about what this damned war is doing.”</p>
<p>“So, she’s not your girlfriend?”</p>
<p>Ben looked at her with a twisted lip, like he suppressed a laugh. “She tell you that? It wouldn’t surprise me. The few times I have shown interest in a woman, Baz would run them off. I ought to tell her to scram for good, but she can be helpful when she wants to be.” He handed the pad back to her. “I do appreciate your taking the time to talk with the Antilles family. Turn this into a great interview and I’ll appreciate you more.”</p>
<p>Rey’s heart lifted. “They’re wonderful people, Zena and Wedge. His sister, too, though we didn’t talk much. They even invited Rose and me to dinner. I think we’re going Sunday after next.”</p>
<p>“Wedge’s mother cooks like a gourmet. Go hungry.”</p>
<p><em>I’d like to go with you.</em> “I don’t have anything planned today, not until Poe Dameron gets back to me with...something I need. Can I hang in the offices and flesh this out?”</p>
<p>Ben was more than happy to accommodate her. He offered use of his desk, and cleared away the extra paper and ashtray. “I’ll finish the typesetting work Baz left behind,” he said. “If the noise bugs you, let me know.”</p>
<p>“It’s fine, thanks,” Rey said, and they settled into work. Rey used the sheets of white lined paper Ben set out for her articles. As she wrote, she stole glances at his back and shoulders while he typed, and longed to walk over and massage away the tension.</p>
<p>Hopefully soon. She bent back over her writing, wishing she had read that damned journal before she drowned it.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. If there is a correct way to eat Necco Wafers, I can't tell you. :-)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Chapter 13</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>3/28/21 - Two-chapter update today.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Sunday, July 7, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>True to Ben’s commitment to his volunteers living their lives, he expelled everybody from <em>The Rebellion</em> at five on Saturday, including Rey. He claimed exhaustion from the long day of work, though Rey imagined Bazine hadn’t helped his mood, and he declined all entreaties to go out. Rey let herself be dragged by her four roommates to Eisley’s, a popular music club on the Oceanfront, where they danced to live music and flirted around until the early hours.</p>
<p>While there, she noticed the <em>Waitress Wanted</em> sign on the door, and made a note to stop by again after Poe delivered the ID. The news shocked Rose. “We were just there. You saw what the waitresses have to wear, right?”</p>
<p>Eisley’s had their servers in knock-off Playboy bunny outfits. Men had grabbed and pinched bottoms all night. Rey admitted it wasn’t ideal, but likely the best she could do with a fake ID, a sketchy backstory, and short notice.</p>
<p>Despite the late night’s revelry, she managed to be up at eight on Sunday and nibbling toast while the rest of the house slept. Rose lent her another shirt, one she could get dirty since she’d be toting newspaper bundles all morning, and a pair of cutoff denim shorts. She used the quiet moment to think about her first full days in 1968.</p>
<p>She hadn’t used a mobile phone, driven a car, or eaten fast food. She’d probably walked more in two days than she had over the course of weeks in her time, though she’d dropped off her morning running habit. It amazed her, too, that she’d been able to adapt to the past so easily. Perhaps memories would come, too.</p>
<p>She didn’t miss having her iPhone in her pocket, constantly reaching for it to check Twitter or Reddit. She didn’t miss her job as much, either, though she thought of Mon Mothma and wondered if time was progressing on in 2018. Had anyone there missed her yet? What would happen Monday when she didn’t show for work? Would the Ben Solo of 2018 notice?</p>
<p>Of course, if she stayed here long enough, all that would be moot. Rey finished her breakfast and rinsed out her dish. She put it on the rack to dry when Rose staggered in, yawning.</p>
<p>“Shall I make coffee?” Rey asked, though as the words came out she realized Keurig didn’t exist here. The Ticos had a stovetop percolator.</p>
<p>“I don’t drink coffee. Wigs me out, man.” Rose took a carton of orange juice from the fridge, drank straight from the spout, and returned it. “That’s Paige and Jannah’s deal. How are you so bright-eyed in the morning?” Her tone accused Rey.</p>
<p>“Just excited to go get <em>The Rebellion</em> today. I’ve never done it before.”</p>
<p>Rose leered at her. “Right. The newspaper. That excites you.”</p>
<p>“It does,” Rey said.</p>
<p>“And not Ben?”</p>
<p>Rey felt the heat creep up her neck. Had she acted so obvious? She’d seen the starry eyes around the office whenever Ben wandered into the great room. It made sense if Rose recognized the signals.</p>
<p>She remained silent, but Rose came up to her and patted her shoulder. “It’s cool, Rey. I don’t blame you for having a thing for him,” he said. “Given the choice between you and Bazine, I know who I’m picking.”</p>
<p>“Thanks. I don’t know that he’s interested anyway.”</p>
<p>Rose grabbed a slice of bread and ate it dry. “Like I said, I know everything that goes on in this town. When I know, so will you.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rey was surprised to see Armitage’s truck parked behind the Samba when she and Rose walked up to the house. Its owner was sitting on the front steps with a mug of coffee, while Bazine rocked on the porch swing, using her bare foot on the floor to push her. The other woman glared at Rey. Rey ignored her and greeted Armitage while Rose stomped over to his truck and kicked a tire.</p>
<p>“Don’t do that,” he said.</p>
<p>“I’m pretending it’s your face,” Rose said.</p>
<p>“You damage my wheels, I’ll run over your face.”</p>
<p>Rose went to the rear tire and kicked that one as well. “And this is Nixon’s ugly old face.” <em>Boot.</em></p>
<p>Rey had to laugh. It had to hurt Rose to do it, with the paper-thin material of her shoes giving her little protection.</p>
<p>Ben, meanwhile, had come out of the house. Heart-stopping in shorts and an open shirt, like he was about to hit the beach. He focused on winding his wristwatch. “Rose, am I going to have to make you sit in the corner like a bad little girl?”</p>
<p>“Honestly, chick, grow the hell up.” Armitage set his mug on the porch railing and stood. “Ben, can we get this show on the road before she gives me a flat?”</p>
<p>“Soon as Poe gets here.” Ben looked up and, on seeing Rey, smiled. “I got Zena Antilles’s interview laid out last night. It looks great.”</p>
<p>“I’m so glad,” Rey said. “I’d like to take a copy to her when Rose and I go for dinner.”</p>
<p>Bazine launched herself off the swing and strode over, stopping close to Ben’s side. She looked as though she intended to deny Rey permission, but Ben spoke up first. “Help us out next week and take as many copies as you like. Poe went over last night and got some pictures. That’s the only thing we’re waiting on before we go to press.”</p>
<p>“You should come to dinner with us, Ben,” Rose called out. She was now torturing Armitage by pretending to touch his truck. “Syal said Wedge was asking about you.”</p>
<p>“Yeah?” Ben addressed this in Rey’s direction, however. Clearly her presence at the Antilles home had opened a few doors. “I’d have to be invited.”</p>
<p>“I’m inviting you,” Rose said, “and I’m sure Rey doesn’t mind, either. And Mrs. Antilles cooks for an army every Sunday anyway.” She then glared at Armitage. “You’re not invited.”</p>
<p>“Says you.” Armitage dipped his fingers in his mug and flicked coffee in Rose’s direction. Kindergarten was getting out of hand.</p>
<p>“Oh, look, Poe’s here. Thank the lord,” Ben called out, sounding exasperated. He began to herd the cats. “Everybody in a vehicle. Let’s go.”</p>
<p>Poe rolled up on a rickety-looking bicycle, which he planted in a line of shrubs lining the porch. He took a large envelope from the basket and waved it at Ben. “Show ‘em to me in the van,” Ben ordered. “Go.”</p>
<p>Bazine pushed past Rey toward the Samba’s shotgun, but to Rey’s delight Rose scrambled there first. This left Bazine to huff and crawl into the van’s padded cavity, and Poe followed. He poked out his head and beckoned to Rey. “Coming, girlie?” He wore a mask of pure mischief.</p>
<p>Rey watched Armitage lope solemnly to the driver’s side of his truck. “If nobody minds,” she said, and looked his way, “would you like some company?”</p>
<p>She swore the world stopped on its axis. Everybody looked at her like <em>she’d</em> voiced support for Nixon. Everybody but Ben. He stepped down to the sidewalk, glancing back at her with an expression of...pride, maybe? He didn’t say anything, but nodded and said he’d see her at the printers.</p>
<p>Armitage paused by his truck. “Uh, sure. I guess.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>“Did Rose put you up to this?”</p>
<p>Armitage’s truck rumbled behind the Samba on a two-lane, mostly paved road surrounded by brush on either side. Rey recognized that they were driving into the rural Pungo area, close to the border of North Carolina. The truck had working AC, but the windows were down for this ride, and Donovan sounded tinny coming out of the radio.</p>
<p>They had to speak loudly over the whipping wind and music. “Why would you ask that?” Rey felt uncomfortable not having a seat belt for this ride. At least Armitage kept his eyes on the road.</p>
<p>“Because she’s always trying to get my goat. Been that way for years,” he said. “So if you’re planning to trash my truck or run me into a ditch, I gotta warn you --”</p>
<p>“I thought you might like some company, is all,” Rey cut in. “Rose had nothing to do with this.” Well, maybe not true. Older Rose’s exchange with Ben at the museum weighed on her mind. She talked trash, but Rey had noticed the wistful change on the woman’s expression on seeing that photo of her and the man driving this truck. A twinge of regret, she guessed, a thought of what Rose might have done differently in this time.</p>
<p>There was so much to know in 1968. Rey intended to get closer to Ben, and as such it meant getting close to the people around him.</p>
<p>Armitage flicked his gaze at her. “You’re cute.”</p>
<p>“So is Rose.”</p>
<p>He laughed hard at that. “What?” Rey challenged him. “You don’t think that her aggressions aren’t some kind of coded message of attraction?” She realized in 2018 she might be derided for suggesting such a notion, but the whole frenemies to lovers trope fascinated her. “That she likes you, but doesn’t want to because you support Nixon?”</p>
<p>“Nixon is a competent leader. He should have won in ‘60 and should’ve tried in ‘64. He could have beaten Johnson,” Armitage said. “I got nothing against the Kennedys, and I sure as hell didn’t want either of them shot. I’m not a ghoul.” He shook his head. “I just feel the more effective leadership is on the Republican side.”</p>
<p><em>This sounds familiar.</em> Rey heard plenty of sound bites throughout the last election she endured. “Do you believe the Republicans can get us out of this war?”</p>
<p>“Should they?”</p>
<p>“What good are we doing there?” Rey asked. “The stories I heard from Wedge Antilles would curl your hair.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry Wedge came back like he did. He and others like him are trying to prevent the spread of communism.” Armitage nodded toward Ben’s van. “Think about what effect communism would have in this country. You think a commie government would let you run around in that outfit, or let Ben publish his newspaper?”</p>
<p>“The way the war is going, will there be anything left of Vietnam to turn communist?” Rey asked. The truck cab chilled significantly at that, and Rey thought of something. Others like him… Armitage wasn’t like Wedge.</p>
<p>“Have you served, Armitage?”</p>
<p>“I’m 3A,” he said.</p>
<p>The rest of the ride was quiet. Rey puzzled over that designation. She knew 4F meant one was physically unfit for military duty. Realizing their conversation had become tense, she chose not to ask.</p>
<p>At the printers, everybody loaded up Ben’s van to the point that nobody could ride in the back. All the bundles fit in the Samba, and it explained why Armitage came along -- he’d be driving all the helpers back in his truck.</p>
<p>Poe took Rey aside during the activity and handed her the fake ID. “Nine out of ten liquor stores can’t tell the difference,” he said. “I even shaved off a year so people will think you’re younger. But I’m sure you get that all the time.”</p>
<p>“Just so I’m old enough to work in a bar,” she said, tucking it into her pocket. “I’m thinking about that job opening at Eisley’s.”</p>
<p>“Tell ‘em you work with Ben. He’s a regular, you’ll be in like Flynn.” Poe winked, and hopped into the truck bed. He held out his hands for Rose, which gave Rey pause.</p>
<p>“You’ll ride in his truck and still hate his guts?”</p>
<p>Rose leaned into her. “Somebody else is riding shotgun in the Samba.”</p>
<p>Of course. Rey sighed and was about to haul herself into the truck when Ben called out to her. He was signing the invoice and had just paid. “Ride back with me?” he asked. “I got a few ideas I want to run by you.”</p>
<p>Her heart lifted. Bazine’s words attempted to shoot it down. “Then where am I sitting?” she demanded.</p>
<p>Ben nodded toward Armitage’s truck. “Do you mind?” he asked, with force, and stared down the young woman. It was clear he wasn’t in the mood for whatever she wanted to bring.</p>
<p>Bazine stomped away and got into the cab, slamming the door. Armitage looked none too happy about the arrangement, either.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Chapter 14</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The ride back to Ben’s was filled with laughter and deep personal conversation. Ben had given thought to Rey’s work and wanted to do more profiles of people at home affected by the war. Girlfriends, siblings, grandparents… it could be Rey’s regular thing for <em>The Rebellion</em>. The idea to include Wedge’s sister came up, and Rey decided to use that as an inroad to getting Ben over for Sunday dinner.</p>
<p>She learned that Ben loved Terry Southern’s novels and preferred the Stones over the Beatles. He’d met Mick but none of the Fabs, though he’d choose George over the rest. He hadn’t met any of The Who in person -- the Pete Townsend interview had been conducted over the phone. Of herself, Rey gave vague information and kept answers to favorites dated mid-Sixties and earlier so as not to give off weird vibes. This naturally led to Ben teasing her about the Monkees.</p>
<p>“I don’t care what you think. I like them.”</p>
<p>Ben smiled, swerving to miss a dip in the road. He held his cigarette out the window as though to toss it, but instead stubbed it out in the ashtray below the eight-track player. “Yeah, I guess they’re okay. If you’re still in elementary school.”</p>
<p>During a lull in the levity, Rey asked, “What does 3A mean?”</p>
<p>Ben looked at her with surprise. “You got that out of Armitage? You <em>are</em> one hell of a reporter.”</p>
<p>“I only asked if he’d served.”</p>
<p>“He doesn’t like to talk about it,” Ben said. “3A is a hardship deferment. Armitage is basically the head of his family. He takes care of his younger brothers and his mom. He works a graveyard shift as a security guard so he can be home during the day. His asshole father took off a few years ago.” Ben’s expression turned grim. “Everybody knows the deal. It’s kind of why I keep asking Rose to lay off.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry to hear that.” Rey’s heart panged for the other man. His truck rolled on ahead of them, with Rose and Poe making goofy faces at them as Ben drove. Behind them, Armitage and Bazine didn’t move much. It didn’t appear like they were enjoying a conversation.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry to tell it,” said Ben. “Though, it’s kept Armitage out of Vietnam and I can’t help but feel relieved about it.”</p>
<p>“It’s interesting that he’s willing to help you out, though he doesn’t agree with you politically.”</p>
<p>“You gotta have friends,” Ben said. “Armie certainly needs them.”</p>
<p>Back at Ben’s, more volunteers had gathered to help unload and distribute copies around town. Some took bundles for their bike baskets and cars; one girl had a wagon she planned to pull out to the boardwalk. Even Armitage took a few.</p>
<p>“You’re much better company,” the ginger-haired man told her. “Ride up with me next week?”</p>
<p>“We’ll see.” She tried for coy and it got her a smile. At the very least, if she could get him and Rose to become friends it would make a nice side project.</p>
<p>The rest of the day kept Ben in his office, working on his speech. Rey helped with the mailers and watched Poe lay out the photos for the July 15th issue. When J.B. Hutt dropped in unannounced, Ben brought out the ad designs to show him and guided the old man onto the porch. “It’s nice out,” was the excuse. Rose appeased him by bringing out Cokes.</p>
<p>Bazine resumed her spot at the typesetter. In between tasks, Rey took a seat at Ben’s desk and glanced at the handwritten speech. His scrawl appeared challenging to read at first, but the longer she stared the better the letters formed. On the whole it was good, but a few points about it jarred her. This was likely not the final draft, too.</p>
<p>The more she read it, the stronger the editor in her fought for release. Rey took a loose sheet of paper and started making notes. She was several sentences in and hadn’t realized the typing noise stopped, not until she heard Bazine’s shrill voice.</p>
<p>“What are you doing? You’re ruining it!” Bazine reached down for Rey’s paper, forcing Rey to shield it with her arm.</p>
<p>“I haven’t marked Ben’s speech. I was just leaving him a critique.”</p>
<p>“You have some nerve,” Bazine said. “You show up out of nowhere and you’re all over Ben like a cheap suit. What gives you the right?”</p>
<p>Ben appeared in the doorway, wearing an astonished expression. “I heard you from the front porch. What is the problem now?” he demanded.</p>
<p>Rey set down her pencil and stood. “It’s my fault. I was poking my nose where it didn’t belong, and Bazine saw fit to call me out on it.”</p>
<p>“She was editing your brilliant speech, Ben,” Bazine said, and snatched up Rey’s notes. “Can you believe that?”</p>
<p>Ben asked to see the paper and read it silently. He wasn’t smiling, but taking his time over Rey’s words. Bazine must have interpreted his lack of reaction as negative toward Rey, and she shifted her stance as though to appear intimidating.</p>
<p>Rey, however, preferred to hear from Ben directly. She liked his speech, but wanted to impart some ideas to give it more impact. She knew he was an amazing writer and personality. Her notes weren’t designed to show superiority over him. Surely he, unlike Bazine, was mature enough to acknowledge that.</p>
<p>Ben kept his head down and backed away, saying nothing to either of them. Bazine flashed Rey a look of triumph, and Rey stormed out of Ben’s office.</p>
<p>She found him in the kitchen, still looking over the paper. “Ben,” she began.</p>
<p>The word broke his trance. He looked up, awaiting the rest.</p>
<p>“I wasn’t --”</p>
<p>“I know,” he said, and folded the paper to put in his back pocket. “And you’re right, about the speech. I do need to make a few changes to that. I appreciate the feedback.”</p>
<p>“Thanks.” The path to get here still made her uneasy, though. Her nerves calmed a bit when Ben moved closer.</p>
<p>“Usually when I ask somebody to review my work, it’s all high praise. People are afraid to offend me, so they’re not totally honest. I’ll hand Bazine an article riddled with spelling errors and she’ll say it’s the best thing written since <em>All the King’s Men</em>. They tell me what they think I want to hear. You just told me what I needed to hear,” he said.</p>
<p>He stood close enough to kiss. Too risky now that she was building trust. “I want to help, Ben. I meant it.”</p>
<p>“You are.” He smiled down at her. “It’s inspired me to help everybody here. I think we all could use a break.”</p>
<p>He left the kitchen and the atmosphere cooled significantly. Rey took a deep breath and followed into the great room when he called for everybody’s attention. As everybody had worked so hard the last few weeks, between getting <em>The Rebellion</em> in circulation and preparing for the concert events, Ben offered to use some of the petty cash funds to treat everybody to a movie tonight.</p>
<p>“<em>Rosemary’s Baby</em> is held over at the Shore Drive-In. I can take a bunch of you in the van. Rose, see if your sister wants to come. I’ll pay for her, too.”</p>
<p>Everybody seemed thrilled with the idea, Rey more so when put his arm around her. “What do you think?”</p>
<p>“I’d love to go to the movies, but <em>Rosemary’s Baby</em>? Scary.”</p>
<p>Ben furrowed his brows. “So you’ve seen it already.”</p>
<p>She had, in her apartment during a Halloween marathon one year. “No… I, uh, read the book.”</p>
<p>“So did I. Guess we’ll see how the movie matches up,” Ben said, and patted her arm before letting go.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Chapter 15</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“I’ve been thinking of doing that all day,” he said, his lips close to her ear. The edge of his under-chin scruff scratched at her, and she tilted her head to take more of that sensation.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>3/30/31 - Two chapters today. The slow burn is soon to ignite, thanks for your patience.</p><p>cw // mention of Roman Polanski</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>An hour before showtime, Armitage pulled up in his truck with Poe. He didn’t have to report back to his security job until Monday evening, and Ben had offered to treat him in thanks for helping out that morning. Bodies piled into both vehicles and they were off.</p><p>Rey was crammed in the back of the van with Poe, Kaydel and other girls from the office, laughing at their jokes and enjoying the camaraderie. From where she sat, she noticed the red truck behind them. It was her idea for Armitage to offer to escort Paige. Apparently he got on well with the older Tico sister. When Rose saw her get in the truck, she squeezed alongside Paige and slammed the door.</p><p>“I don’t trust you with my sister,” Rose told him. Rey smiled at the memory of it, suspecting jealousy on Rose’s part.</p><p>On the ride down, she entertained herself reading the notes people had left inside Ben’s van. “Poe, is this really your phone number?” she asked, pointing to his “good time” message.</p><p>“You know it, baby. Memorize it.” He winked at her.</p><p>Rey stole a glance at the front of the van, where Bazine had claimed the shotgun position beside Ben. The reflection in the rear view mirror of Ben’s quiet expression spoke of weariness on his part, though she swore his gaze reached her directly.</p><p>Somebody nudged her. Kaydel was waving a marker. “You should make your mark, Rey.”</p><p><em>R.B. was here.</em> A trite message to leave for future generations. It had looked silly to her when Ben showed it to her 2018. If she was going to deface his van, she wanted the words to have impact.</p><p>She waited for the van not to shake as much while Ben drove. At the right moment, she uncapped the marker and wrote in a clean space on the inside wall, <em>The love you take is equal to the love you make.</em></p><p>Okay, they weren’t her words, they were The Beatles'. The song from which it came wouldn’t be released for another year, however, so she had time to make it her own.</p><p>“That is so deep,” Kaydel said on reading it.</p><p>“I can’t take full credit for it,” Rey said. “I heard it in passing.”</p><p>“Well, whoever said it first must be pretty cool.”</p><p>Rey nodded. “I think so.”</p><p>Ben pulled into line at the drive-in entrance first. Tonight they were charging by the vehicle for a double feature of<em> Rosemary’s Baby</em>, to be preceded by an Elvis movie called <em>Frankie and Johnny</em>. Interesting lead-in to the Polanski-directed horror.</p><p>Ben parked the van in the middle of the back row, and Armitage backed up his truck so the bed faced the giant outdoor screen. Other cars filled a few slots, and more were streaming in as the sun set. Everybody spilled out as the van’s side door opened, with some of the girls -- Rose included -- jockeying for space in the truck bed.</p><p>Rey weighed her options for the best view. She watched Armitage boost Paige onto the rounded hood of his truck, from where she crawled to the top of the cab, sitting crossed-legged. He didn’t join her just yet, however.</p><p>Ben tapped her shoulder. “Come with me. I got the best seat in the house.” He opened the back and pulled out two blankets, tossing one to Poe, and a small ladder which he leaned on the rear quarter panel. He saw Rey up to the roof and had her spread out the blanket before climbing. Poe and Bazine followed, the other woman shooting daggers with her eyes when Ben settled in next to Rey.</p><p>“You don’t think you’ll get too scared tonight?” he whispered.</p><p>“We will see.” The movie had disturbed her plenty the first time around. She wasn’t into this brand of horror, but if it brought her closer to Ben she was willing to risk frazzled nerves. “That Elvis, he’s one frightening cat.”</p><p>He put his arm around her, laughing. The sticky July air turned more pleasant at his touch. “Just put your head here if you don’t want to watch, and I mean any of it.” He tapped the crook of his shoulder.</p><p><em>Even if I do?</em> Was this a date? It occurred to her, too, that Ben might be using her as a shield to keep Bazine off his back tonight. She chanced a look behind them and noticed the other woman had taken up a cozy position with Poe on the other blanket. No doubt an attempt to make Ben jealous. Didn’t seem to be working.</p><p>“Hey, Solo,” called a young voice from the ground. Rey looked to see a boy of about ten or eleven with stuck-out ears.</p><p>Ben lay back, turning to talk to the kid. “What is it, Grogu?”</p><p>“My dad says you’re a lazy bum.”</p><p>“Is that right?” Ben didn’t react, just shrugged. “Well, guess it takes one to know one.”</p><p>Grogu’s response was to kick the Samba, hard. Rey witnessed the origin of the dent she saw in the museum.</p><p>“Hey, don’t kick my van.” His voice turned stern but not angry. “C’mere for a sec. What are you even doing here? You better not be sticking around for <em>Rosemary’s Baby</em>, that’s not a kid’s movie.”</p><p>“I ain’t scared to watch,” Grogu said. “I seen all the monster movies and I don’t have nightmares.”</p><p>“Well, if you do get scared, you go inside the van and wait, and we’ll take you home.” Ben pulled a few dollar bills out of his pocket. “You see all the girls in the next truck? I want you to go buy popcorn for them. And get some for this young lady right here, and a pack of gum for me. Keep the change.”</p><p>The boy collected the money as it fluttered to the ground and ran off, a wide grin on his face.</p><p>“You sure he’ll come back?” Rey asked when Ben sat up.</p><p>Ben nodded. “Grogu’s not a bad kid. He probably snuck in with some of his friends, somebody with an older brother. Plus, if he behaves, the girls will let him sit in the truck.”</p><p>“A true ladies’ man, huh?” Speaking of… Rey caught sight of Armitage coming back with a cardboard tray of snacks, which he handed to Paige before hopping on the roof of the cab. She also didn’t miss Rose’s raised eyebrow on viewing the scene.</p><p>True to Ben’s expectations, young Grogu returned, arms loaded with popcorn. Ben reached down for his gum and the smallest container to give to Rey, and the boy received a welcome reception at the truck bed. Rey laughed to see the boy’s elation, and didn’t bother to check for Bazine’s reaction to the whole scene. As it was, it got too dark to see and the first movie began.</p><p>Poor Elvis. Smack dab in the middle of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band and the Age of Aquarius, and Colonel Parker still had him making cheesy musicals better suited to the Fifties. What made it tolerable, though, was Ben’s around her, and his rubbing his hand up and down her arm. Scents of tobacco and spearmint filled her nose.</p><p>“This movie is so dumb,” he said.</p><p>“I know. How’s that little boy doin?”</p><p>Ben stretched up to check on him. “He is sound asleep. Everybody’s a critic. Hey, Rose,” he called down, “put him in the van. I got some comic books in there he can read if he wakes.”</p><p>Ben shook the dozen or so unpopped kernels in the large paper cup. “You want more?” he asked, and though she declined he swung his legs over the side, hopping down. Rey, not expecting the move, looked down to see Ben holding out his arms to her. He gestured for her to jump, and caught her as she came down.</p><p>Bazine leaned over the edge. “Where are you going?” Poe’s face then came into view, and the other man pulled her back. Ben didn’t answer, but led Rey along the back wall. Every slot in the back row was filled. They walked past station wagons and convertibles, mostly. Rey saw more than a few pairs of heads touching, and some steamed-up windows.</p><p>“You don’t look like you’re into this,” he said. “Let’s sit a bit over here.”</p><p>No arguments. The idea of drive-in and chill with Ben appealed to her more, but not with a child in the van and the entire <em>Rebellion</em> staff watching. The theater had a small playground in the far corner of the property, albeit poorly lit. There was a swingset and monkey bars, a multi-colored roundabout and a see-saw. Everything looked aged and tinged with rust due to exposure, but Rey followed Ben into the abandoned area and took the lower part of the see-saw when he straddled the raised half with his long legs.</p><p>He came down with a hard thud, nearly springing her out of the molded seat. She let out a loud cry and spreadeagled her legs. Damn, but Ben shot her high, about four or five feet. No wonder these things got banned in the twenty-first century. How were more kids not concussed?</p><p>“Look at you, Peter Pan.” Ben laughed.</p><p>“Get me down!”</p><p>Ben planted his feet and pushed up. Rey tried with all her might to weigh down her end and give Ben some lift, to no avail. Finally they gave up and moved to the merry go round. Rey sat in the middle, grasping two bars while Ben ran one lap around for a long spin. He hopped on and they lay back, watching the stars streak into circular fingers of light.</p><p>As the ride slowed, Ben turned to her. “I just swallowed my gum. I am trying so hard not to throw up now.”</p><p>“Me, too.” The popcorn wasn’t sitting well, and closing her eyes made the movement more intense. She focused instead on Ben’s face in the dim light as the spinning disk slugged to a stop. Ben had helped it along by lowering one shoe to the dirt as a brake.</p><p>“I’d hate to leave a mess for some poor drive-in worker to hose down,” she said.</p><p>He removed his glasses and slid them into his front shirt pocket. “I have a different reason,” he said, and leaned over to press his lips against hers. Ben touched the side of her face as he kissed her, and she brought her hand up to cover his. They were still a moment, though the ride swayed a bit, and Rey guessed Ben was trying to gauge her reaction to this forward move.</p><p>She tasted sweat, cigarettes and mint gum in one startling yet curious combination, and she wanted more of it. Rey opened her mouth wider in invitation and Ben moved his hand to her waist and pulled her closer. Her legs scraped the metal surface of the disk as she tried to roll her body. No doubt she took some of the peeling paint with her, but Ben’s urgent tugging spurred her to straddle his hips.</p><p>Rey rested on top of him, kissing deep and tangling her fingers in his hair. When she moved her upper lip over his, she twitched at the first nick of his mustache. Ben peeled off to take in air and held her tight, urging her to sit up with him so she could rest in his lap.</p><p>“I’ve been thinking of doing that all day,” he said, his lips close to her ear. The edge of his under-chin scruff scratched at her, and she tilted her head to take more of that sensation.</p><p>“What took you so long?” Her voice cracked, pitching high with her joy.</p><p>Ben laughed. “Well, for one, I wasn’t certain how you’d react. It’s kind of why I brought you out here, in case you socked me one,” he said.</p><p>“You don’t have to worry about that.”</p><p>“For two, we were around people all day,” he said. “No real opportunity. I mean, I kiss one girl in the office and I have to kiss them all.”</p><p>She laughed at that. “How do you stand it, all those adoring stares while you’re trying to work?”</p><p>“Any tales you may have heard about my romantic prowess are greatly exaggerated,” Ben said. He patted her hip to get her to stand and asked to be pulled up. “I haven’t been on a date since I don’t know when. Protests don’t count, either. I’m talking about a bona fide, put on nice shoes, shave, and take a lady out to dinner date.”</p><p>“It can’t be because you’re low on prospects.” Rey took his hand when he offered it and they walked back toward the back line of cars. “So you know, if you were ever to ask me out you don’t need to shave. I rather like this.” She gestured to his face and longish hair.</p><p>“It’s about all I can stand,” he said. “What are you doing tomorrow?”</p><p>“Looking for a job. Putting in a few hours at <em>The Rebellion</em>. Maybe a break for lunch with Rose to watch her stories.”</p><p>“Sounds like a full day. Spare an hour for dinner at the house?”</p><p>Rey’s heart lifted. The wheels were in motion. “I can spare more than that.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. Frankie and Johnny actually came out in 1966, though in my research it appeared it was not uncommon for theaters to show older films. I assume they showed what reels they could get. Rosemary's Baby, by comparison, was a more recent release in this time.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Chapter 16</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Monday, July 8 to Thursday, July 11, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The week had flown, too quickly for Rey’s liking. On Monday, after a short morning meeting at <em>The Rebellion</em> where Ben approved her next assignment, she turned up at Eisley’s in Rose’s best slacks and a modest blouse to apply for a job.</p>
<p>The bar’s owner, who seemed more interested in her measurements than her falsified resume, hired her on the spot to work nights Tuesday through Saturday, starting the next night. He’d supply the working uniform, a form-fitting Playboy bunny knock-off ensemble, but she had to provide her own tights and heels. She’d get a laughable salary but would keep all her tips. “With a bod like yours,” he said in a growly voice, “you’ll do all right.”</p>
<p>Ben shook his head, smiling, on hearing Rey’s version of it when she returned to his house for dinner that night. “Well, he’s not wrong,” he said, taking Rey by the waist and pulling her close for a kiss. He then promised to be at Eisley’s every night she worked, when possible, to keep an eye out for especially grabby patrons. “When I can’t,” he added, “I know some others who can take a night off to help.”</p>
<p>Rey imagined he meant Armitage on his own nights off. She omitted that assumption when discussing her day with Rose and Paige in front of the TV while waiting for <em>Peyton Place</em> to start. “I still can’t believe you’re going to work there,” Rose said, making a face of disgust. “You’ve seen how those waitresses are treated.”</p>
<p>“It’s a job, Rose. I’m sure Rey can hold her own,” Paige said. “Wouldn’t hurt for you to find a way to bring in some bread.”</p>
<p>“Why don’t you come out my first night?” Rey suggested to Rose. “A lot of businessmen patronize the club. You could chat them up and sell advertising for <em>The Rebellion</em>. Ben said he'd be able to pay staff if more money came in...sell the paper and you get a commission.”</p>
<p>Rose made no promises, but on Tuesday night she, Paige and Jannah came out to support her, as did Ben and several familiar faces from <em>The Rebellion</em>. Jannah introduced Rey to her boyfriend, Finn, a quiet and serious young man who spent much of the night listening to the live quartet. Between their table and the rest of her stations, Rey made a decent haul in tips.</p>
<p>On Wednesday morning, after helping paste up her Wedge Antilles interview, she paid back the money Ben loaned her for the remainder of her work uniform. He tucked the bills into his back pocket. “This is probably what I tipped you last night,” he said when they were alone in his office. “Do you technically still owe me money?”</p>
<p>Rey shrugged. “I suppose we are caught in an endless loop. I’d give you more, but I wanted to help Paige with some of the bills.” She also wanted to buy some clothes and give Rose back her closet.</p>
<p>Ben closed his door to seal them away from the others, leaning on it. “Pay me back another way,” he said, and beckoned her close for a kiss. Crushed against his body, Rey relaxed into his embrace and reached up to rake her fingers through his hair. He lowered one of his hands to palm her ass, and she responded by pinning one of his thighs between her legs, riding him slowly.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” he asked, chuckling.</p>
<p>“Sorry.” Rey wore her “time travel” jeans, which were too thick to encourage any ecstatic friction, anyway. She tried to pull away but Ben held her tighter.</p>
<p>“I didn’t say stop,” he said, and nibbled on her jawline down her neck. His tobacco smelled strong; she was getting used to it, but worried about the adverse effect on his health. “Rey, would you like to --”</p>
<p>A hard knock on the other side of the door silenced him. “Ben, are you in there?” Bazine demanded. “J.B. Hutt sent over a new ad. It needs to go in.”</p>
<p>They both sighed. Cockblocking, Sixties style.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>With the July 15th issue ready for press on Thursday morning, Ben invited Rey to ride along to the printers. “It’s typically a job I handle on my own, but a second person should know what to do in the event I can’t,” he said. She agreed to be at<em> The Rebellion</em> at nine in the morning to accompany him, but circumstances -- namely Rose not having a reliable clock in her room and Rey sleeping in after a particularly chaotic Wednesday night shift -- caused her to be tardy.</p>
<p>She was hurrying up Ben’s street when she skidded to a halt in front of his neighbor’s home. A stately-looking older woman was descending the porch steps. She was dressed modestly in a short-sleeved dress hitting below the knees -- dark yellow with a matching hat -- with her purse straps hooked over her arm. White gloves, too. All signs pointed to well-to-do matron, and Rey wondered who she was to <em>The Rebellion</em> -- landlord, advertiser…?</p>
<p>She looked up just as Rey reached the bottom step, and gave Rey a smile that looked reserved, mannered.</p>
<p>“Good morning,” the woman said. “I don’t believe I’ve seen you here before.”</p>
<p>“I’m new,” Rey said, feeling sorely undressed in the new jeans and vest-like top. She hesitated in offering a hand; the woman nodded and continued past her to a green Cadillac, all headlights and fins, parked behind the Samba.</p>
<p>She watched the woman drive off, then turned to find Ben standing in the doorway. “You’re late,” he said, but not unkindly.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry. I overslept.”</p>
<p>“I’m not surprised. They ran you ragged last night.” Ben had nursed a beer for much of Rey’s shift, mindful of the eyes and hands of male patrons within her reach. Rey had taken to the serving work quickly, though, knowing the right things to say to increase her tip count, without compromising herself. “Did she say anything to you?” he asked, nodded to where the Caddy had turned.</p>
<p>“Not much. She said good morning, and that she didn’t know me.”</p>
<p>Ben leaned in the doorway. “That’s more than what my mother’s said to half the people here,” he said, and beckoned her closer. “Come upstairs. I want to give you something.”</p>
<p>She followed him inside, greeting the other girls who were well into their work for the day. Rey felt bad to have missed an hour on seeing how many newspapers were still being stamped and addressed to subscribers.</p>
<p>Ben was halfway up the stairs to his private apartment when he called for her. She didn’t think much of taking the first few steps until the office suddenly quieted down. The girls stopped talking amongst themselves. Kay let a phone ring unanswered. Rey turned back to see all gazes on her. Bazine’s transcended horrified, straight to murderous.</p>
<p>“Rey?” Ben gestured for her to hurry up. She focused on him now, and reached the top. She’d been up here before, when she joined him for dinner Monday night. The second floor of the house had two large rooms; Ben used the front-facing one for sleep and the back as a combination living and dining room.</p>
<p>In his bedroom, Ben rummaged through the top drawer of his dresser and retrieved a watch. Rey smiled at the classic Mickey Mouse design, with his gloved hands pointing out the hours and minutes. Ben wound it up for her. “This should keep you on time,” he said. “Don’t forget to wind it, okay?”</p>
<p>“Right.” One more thing to learn in 1968, yet she didn’t miss having her phone with its calendar constantly reminding her of appointments. For a moment she envied Rose, living freely on her own time.</p>
<p>He gave her a quick kiss. “The dummy sheets are packed. I’ll load them in the van and we’ll be off.”</p>
<p>Downstairs, it remained quiet until Ben reached the bottom and remarked on it. <em>The Rebellion</em> volunteers slowly resumed their work. Rey caught sight of Rose, talking with Kay, and was about to turn toward Ben’s office when her friend steered her outside.</p>
<p>“What were you doing up there?” Rose demanded. “Did you have permission? Was he upset?”</p>
<p>“Permission?” Rey shook her arm to dislodge Rose’s grip. “Why would he be upset? He asked me upstairs.”</p>
<p>Rose’s eyes widened, and her mouth gaped open for a second. She turned. “Rey, <em>nobody</em> has been up in Ben’s apartment. That’s one of the cardinal rules, you don’t follow him up there. Bazine’s never been up there!”</p>
<p>“Really?” Rey leaned past Rose to look through the open front door. Business as usual inside, and in the distance she saw Bazine pacing in Ben’s office while he ignored her. The woman’s voice, loud and angry, drifted toward them. Rey didn’t catch everything said, but clearly heard <em>her or me</em>, no doubt relayed as a threat.</p>
<p>Neither Rose nor any of her other roommates knew about the Monday night dinner date. Rey kept it to herself, seeing no need to fuel office gossip. She held up her wrist. “He was only giving me a watch,” she said.</p>
<p>“He could have done that downstairs,” Rose said, giving her a sly smile. “Something’s happening here…”</p>
<p>Rey opted for silence. Eventually the truth would out, but Ben had to have a say in that as well. She offered to help with the dummy sheets when he emerged from his office, and he asked her to get the side door of his bus. “Make sure she doesn’t burn the place down,” he said to Rose on the way out.</p>
<p>He meant Bazine, Rey realized. The other woman came stomping out towards them, screaming like a spurned lover, threatening to never darken<em> The Rebellion</em>’s door again. Ben shut the van’s side door and turned on her, hovering yet not menacing.</p>
<p>“Baz, have I ever given you the impression that your work on this newspaper was not appreciated?” he asked.</p>
<p>Bazine stepped back, appearing intimidated and upset. “No.”</p>
<p>“Have I ever given you the impression that I wanted more from you than skills that could benefit <em>The Rebellion</em>? Have I ever come on to you?”</p>
<p>“No,” she said, “and I don’t understand why. You barely know her --” Bazine gestured toward Rey and Ben held up a hand to silence her.</p>
<p>“I am on the cusp of not only making<em> The Rebellion</em> profitable, but being able to finally compensate you all, with actual money. Did you know Rose brought us a sale the other day? Somebody she met at Eisley’s. He’s advertising with us for the rest of the year.”</p>
<p><em>Really?</em> Rey had noticed Rose chatting up somebody in a suit one of those nights. She was actually creating influence...could she also get her to warm up to Armitage Hux?</p>
<p>She got into the van, unable to keep watching Bazine vent her frustrations at Ben. The other woman demanded him to explain his attention to Rey, and he said, “Baz, it’s my business. I like you, I appreciate your work, but this is my business. We have to leave.”</p>
<p>With that, he got behind the wheel and didn’t say anything until they turned onto the main road toward Pungo.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Chapter 17</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes // semi-public fooling around</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I’m sorry you had to see that, Rey.” Ben pushed in the dashboard cigarette lighter, then took a cig from the pack in his front pocket and stuck it between his lips. “Everybody else in that office is okay with boundaries but her. I guess I haven’t made it clear enough that I don’t see her as a romantic interest.”</p>
<p>Rey said nothing, and focused on the road for much of the trip. It struck her that perhaps Ben had made it clear, more than once, and Bazine simply chose to hear differently.</p>
<p>The occasional glance in Ben’s direction stirred her heart, and despite their blossoming mutual attraction she fought to keep it subdued for now. This was new territory, with anything capable of happening. She held her purse tight on her lap, thinking of the museum badge pinned to the inner lining. It would never see the light of day.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry,” she said.</p>
<p>The lighter popped, and Ben pulled out the red hot coil to light his cigarette. “What for? You haven’t done anything wrong. You’ve done so much for <em>The Rebellion</em> in a little over a week.” He smiled at her. “You amaze me.”</p>
<p>“I wrote two articles, Ben. I’ve seen issues where you’ve written nearly the entire thing.”</p>
<p>“You have to start somewhere. And Rose told me it was your idea for her to sell ad space. I didn’t expect her to reel in a big fish like Gial Ackbar on the first try,” he said.</p>
<p>Rey knew the name. The Ackbar family were diamond-level sponsors of The Naboo Gallery in the twenty-first century. What one of them wanted to advertise in a liberal activist newspaper now was a mystery to her, but if it brought Ben capital… “You’re welcome,” she said, “but the sale credit goes to Rose.”</p>
<p>“She’ll get a commission. Paige will like that, and so will the staff once I figure out a budget for payroll. Maybe it will encourage Rose to work more steadily.”</p>
<p>At the printers, Rey met the owners and received a brief tour of the facility. She got a charge out of Ben introducing her as his assistant. She looked forward to returning Sunday and holding the issue with Zena’s interview, as much as going back with Ben to work on the next one.</p>
<p>“You mind a detour first?” he asked once they were in the van. “I need a break.”</p>
<p>“You’re not worried to come back to a burned husk of a building?” She risked the joke, and relief took hold when Ben laughed.</p>
<p>They reached the road leading back to the Oceanfront, but Ben turned in the opposite direction toward the Sandbridge area. In 2018, the neighborhood was popular among seasonal tourists who rented the large beach homes for extended periods. Presently, it was developed, but to Rey it appeared that the homes were more residential in nature. Ben steered the van to a halt alongside a sand-covered stretch of road, nowhere close to an access path to the beach.</p>
<p>“I keep towels in the back, if you’ll grab a few,” he said, and he spread the largest one out on a secluded spot for them to share. Rey saw why Ben preferred this beach to the more public one near his home. Fewer people -- the closest were mere dots in the distance -- and quiet. Even the sand felt softer and the air fresher. Rey took the tang of salt deep into her lungs.</p>
<p>She reclined on her elbows and watched Ben remove his glasses, then unbutton and remove his shirt, then unbuckle his pants. “Do you swim?” he asked.</p>
<p>“I’m not the best, but yeah.” Rey fixed on his broad, bare chest, her mouth turning dry. She’d seen him in various stages of undress, but completely stripped to the waist was a whole new experience. When the jeans were shoved down to reveal he wasn’t wearing underwear...<em>holy mother</em>…</p>
<p>Ben was a shower, and in all likelihood a grower as well. Definitely not shy. He eyed her, seeing she was still dressed. “You coming?”</p>
<p>Rey turned her head. How to answer that? <em>About to, yes.</em> The heat radiating from her body had nothing to do with the summer sun. She didn’t want to talk directly at his thick cock dangling from its thick nest of dark hair. This was what she wanted, though, right? This man, in every sense. Would it happen today?</p>
<p>“Sure,” she said finally, and stood up to undress. She didn’t own a bra yet, but did purchase underwear which covered more of her lower half than what she was used to wearing. The thong, apparently, hadn’t been invented or mass commercialized yet. Her outerwear came off and she stood there in nothing but her pink, Sixties-style full cut briefs.</p>
<p>Ben kept his gaze on her face. Nudity wasn’t so big a deal. “Race you,” he said, and took off for the sea.</p>
<p>“Hey!” He got a good head start, and with longer legs put forth a substantial lead. Rey chased him down to the water, screeching at the initial wave of cold washing over her skin. Salt water splashed onto her face and eyes, stinging them. She tried to wipe the pain away, but with her hands covered it only amplified the sensation.</p>
<p>Ben, meanwhile, had run far enough into the ocean to dive into the surf. He emerged a good distance from her, standing waist deep as the water roiled back and forth. Rey let the tide pull her deeper in, but Ben remained out of reach. She collapsed to submerge herself and cover her bare breasts, in the event of passersby, and heard Ben call out to her.</p>
<p>“Hang on. I got you.” He waded closer and extended a hand out, which she took. The tide pulled them back again, and Rey lost her footing in the sand. No matter; Ben had her in his arms.</p>
<p>He was dripping everywhere, from the matted tendrils of his hair to his long nose. “I thought you were about to go under there,” he said, loudly over the roar of the waves bouncing them back and forth.</p>
<p>“No, just a moment of shyness.” She realized Ben’s hands cupped her bottom, and he was snaking one up to slip a few fingers under the elastic waistband.</p>
<p>She licked her lips, tasting brine. She kicked to stay afloat, eventually tangling her legs around his, and bringing her thighs closer to his bulge.</p>
<p>Ben’s eyes darkened as he gazed down at her. “You look good wet,” he said.</p>
<p>“It’s why I moved to the beach.”</p>
<p>He crushed his mouth against hers in a hard kiss, pushing his tongue in deep. She opened to receive him, and relaxed against his body, trusting him to hang onto her as the waves ripped around them higher and higher. She felt his hands push down those granny panties, then pull over her hips until the fabric roped somewhere around her knees.</p>
<p>She kicked them off and let them get sucked into the tide. Maybe they’d turn up on the other side of the world one day. Ben maneuvered her legs apart to press her mound against his leg, like she’d attempted in the office earlier in the week.</p>
<p>“You ever come underwater?” he asked when their lips parted. “Can I do that for you, Rey?” When she nodded he began to rock her up and down, using his hand on the small of her back to pin her to his body. She squirmed to make sure her clit pressed on his hard leg for the best friction. She’d never attempted this before, in the ocean or elsewhere, but enjoyed the sensation of being <em>ohsoclose</em>.</p>
<p>“Will you touch me, Rey?”</p>
<p>She had her arms draped around his neck, and moved one down into the water, murky with stirred-up sand and foam. They kissed more gently, slow and searching as she found his cock and stroked him. He was already beginning to harden judging from what she felt, interesting since cold water tended to have the opposite effect. She couldn’t wait to have him inside her.</p>
<p>Ben moaned, the sound vibrating around her lips. Was this how it happened the first time? What had Ben written in his journal about this moment? If only she hadn’t destroyed it before she got to that part.</p>
<p>In the distance, a loud whooping sound carried over the water and tore through them. Rey let go of his prick and drew her hand back to his neck. Ben turned his face away and cursed. “I don’t believe this,” he said, his voice growling.</p>
<p>“What is it?” Rey followed his line of vision, and that’s when she saw the long, black and white Chevy parked behind the van. Lights on the roof and a loudspeaker.</p>
<p>Busted.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Chapter 18</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“Everything’s cool,” he told her in a low voice. “That’s my Uncle Luke. He happened to see the van and stopped.”</p><p>“Then why did he call you out of the water?”</p><p>“He knows I like to skinny dip here,” he said. “He’s just being an ass, but he wants to meet you.”</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>An officer got out of the car but lingered by the driver’s side door, watching them. “Come on out, Ben,” he called through the loudspeaker, then slammed the door and approached.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” Rey asked, her heart pounding. “Is he going to arrest you?”</p><p>“No, but he as may as well after I get done with him.” Ben shook his head as though to expel the thought. “Will you be alright here for a few minutes? Stay submerged. I’ll come back with a towel.”</p><p>Rey crossed her arms over her breasts and let Ben carry her to where she could stand comfortably. She watched him trudge out of the surf, naked and wet and angry. The cop met him halfway with their towels. Ben snatched one and covered his waist, all the while exchanging words that sounded terse but were wholly unintelligible for the ocean’s roar.</p><p>The police officer, thumbs hooked in his belt, kept glancing in her direction. He was close enough to where Rey could discern his expression. The man seemed amused and concerned at the same time, and he stayed put when Ben turned to walk to the shoreline. He held out the towel, creating a block of sorts to keep the cop from seeing too much as Rey emerged from the water. She kept her arms crossed but remembered her panties had sailed away, so she ran fast into Ben as he wrapped her up.</p><p>“Everything’s cool,” he told her in a low voice. “That’s my Uncle Luke. He happened to see the van and stopped.”</p><p>“Then why did he call you out of the water?”</p><p>“He knows I like to skinny dip here,” he said. “He’s just being an ass, but he wants to meet you.”</p><p><em>Oh dear.</em> If Officer Uncle asked to see her ID, what then? He’d spot it as a fake for certain.</p><p>Ben’s uncle stood a few inches shorter than his nephew, but the uniform gave him an intimidating air. He wore a thin beard and Rey noticed some facial scarring, but when Ben introduced her his face softened and he spoke with a pleasant tone.</p><p>“Rey, if you don’t mind my asking your age,” Luke began.</p><p>Ben sagged. “Christ, Luke, she’s legal.”</p><p>Luke shrugged. “I gotta ask, kid. Your house is overrun with young ladies. People talk.”</p><p>“I’m twenty-five,” Rey said. “Sir.”</p><p>Ben put his arm around her. “We were just taking a swim break before going back to<em> The Rebellion</em>,” he said. “Surely there are more serious infractions occurring around town worth your interference.”</p><p>“Be thankful it was me driving past, Ben,” Luke said. “You’re not exactly considered Mr. Congeniality, and any other cop wouldn’t hesitate to drag both of you in for balling on a public beach.”</p><p>Rey winced at the crude euphemism.</p><p>“We weren’t <em>balling</em>,” Ben snapped. “If we decide to, next time we’ll swim out to international waters first. Okay?”</p><p>Luke didn’t laugh. He gave Ben a sharp look and said, “Watch yourself, okay, Ben? And keep your friend out of trouble until your mother’s had a proper introduction. I’ll see you around.”</p><p>As Ben’s uncle started back to his car, Rey looked up and whispered, “Proper introduction?”</p><p>He nodded. “I was going to tell you later. My mother and Zena Antilles are good friends. She heard about your interview, and dinner on Sunday, and Zena invited her, too. And me.”</p><p>“That’s a good thing, though, right?” They walked back to their towel and sat. Rey stretched out her legs to let the sun dry her skin.</p><p>“In a way. I wanted to talk to you about it because...well, there’s somebody else I’d like to bring. I hope you’re cool with it.”</p><p>“Okay.” Ominous. He couldn’t mean Bazine. Or Armitage. Rose would have a fit. Who else held Ben’s fancy?</p><p>When he told her, his thought process became clear. “You think it will work?” she asked.</p><p>“I hope so,” Ben said. “That family needs some kind of happy ending, and knowing that you were able to reach Wedge and bring him halfway to that point gives me some hope.”</p><p>Rey’s gaze fell to the Marian medal hanging from Ben’s neck. Her arms stretched wide in a loving gesture… it served as a wonderful inspiration. She brought her hand to his face and held him a moment.</p><p>“We should get back to the office before I do end up balling you on this beach,” Ben said.</p><p>“That could also be a good thing, you know.”</p><p>Ben kissed her quickly and reached for his jeans. “Not with that audience,” he said, indicating the family coming down from the road, laden with equipment for a long, planned afternoon. “But don’t worry. First opportunity in a private place.”</p><p>“I’ll hold you to it,” Rey said.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Chapter 19</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes // marijuana use, unprotected sex, s'mores, sex with s'mores</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Saturday July 13 to Sunday, July 14, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Saturday night at Eisley’s was Rey’s baptism by fire. It was easily the busiest night of her brief career to date, and an indication of what to expect for her foreseeable future as a cocktail bunny. The increase in her tips corresponded with the rise in volume of propositions and ass-grabs, and Rey used the opportunity to perfect a hip-swiveling dodge designed to give patrons the impression she was flirting when she was actually attempting to avoid eager hands.</p>
<p>Armitage’s presence at the club on Saturday night caused a stir, not for any obvious vigilance but for his attention to Paige Tico throughout the night. He bought her drinks and danced with her, all the while Rose glowered from the corner of Ben’s table.</p>
<p>“What’s his deal?” she asked Rey when the latter took a short break outside for fresh air. Not that Rey got any for all the pot and cigarette smoke surrounding them. “Hasn’t said boo to my sister in years and all of a sudden he’s buying her popcorn at the movies and now drinks at the club.”</p>
<p>“Are you jealous of the attention she’s getting?” Rey asked. She’d formulated her own answer, though it didn’t align with Rose’s.</p>
<p>She wrinkled her nose. “Guys pay attention to me. I can date anybody I want.”</p>
<p>“Except Ben,” Rey said, to which Rose replied by sticking out her tongue. The younger woman’s response to Paige, when they got home in the early hours and got into it about Armitage, involved more profanity and door slamming.</p>
<p>Paige glanced at Rey after Rose stormed into her room and shook her head. “They’ll be married in a year, I think.”</p>
<p>“You’re that confident,” Rey said with a laugh.</p>
<p>“I’d bet your night’s tips on it,” Paige said. “He danced with me, yeah, but he was looking at her most of the night.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>For Sunday’s dinner, Rey splurged on a nice belted green dress with short sleeves and a Peter Pan collar, and wore her work tights and shoes. The dress, typical of the style, came up nearly mid-thigh but the top half looked modest enough. She’d be sitting at a table for much of the evening, so hopefully Mrs. Solo and Mrs. Antilles wouldn’t cluck their tongues with disapproval.</p>
<p>She brought two rolls of Necco Wafers for Wedge, who accepted them with quiet thanks, then introduced his father, Jagged. “Would you believe he actually agrees with you, eating these in alphabetical order?” he joked. “You both could use some education.”</p>
<p>Rey sat next to him in a chair brought in from the kitchen. She handed him a copy of <em>The Rebellion</em>, fresh off the press, and gave his parents one as well. The family marveled at the interview and complimented the photos Poe had taken of Zena at work in her kitchen, teasing about her newfound celebrity. “Your interview looks great, too,” she told Wedge. “I previewed the layout; it goes to press in a few days.”</p>
<p>“I’m glad I gave it,” he said. His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and Rey wondered if he had regrets. Her worries faded when he added, “The story needs to be told. I never thought I’d be the one pushed into any spotlights. That’s more Ben Solo’s bag.” He glanced back at the handles on his chair. “Of course, one can’t help but be pushed around in this thing.”</p>
<p>Rey squeezed his hand, happy he didn’t pull away. He was in a good mood, which pleased and worried her. She thought about Ben’s plan and wondered if it was presumptuous of them to go through with it.</p>
<p>She heard a car door slam in the distance, then the doorbell. No time to back out, she realized, and watched Jagged Antilles open the door for Ben and his mother, and Ben’s “plus one.”</p>
<p>Rey watched for Wedge’s reaction as the young, black-haired woman entered. She wore a multi-colored minidress resembling a Mondrian painting -- very “mod,” as one might say -- and radiated an aura of shyness. She fixed her smile on Wedge as her parents and sister gathered close to greet her. On instinct, Rey rose from her chair and offered the new guest her seat.</p>
<p>Wedge introduced Rey to Mala Tinero. “Mala and I...and Ben, we all went up through school together. We are good friends.”</p>
<p>“I hope more than that, still,” Mala said. The young woman looked as though she wanted to slide onto Wedge’s lap. Her adoration for the man was palpable in the crowded space. “I wanted to welcome you home, Wedge.”</p>
<p>Rey stepped back, closer to Ben, to watch the reunion. The two soon behaved as though they were the only ones in the room, and when Zena announced dinner they were the last to take their places. After the delicious multi-course meal, when everybody moved back into the living room for coffee, Wedge and Mala remained at the table, catching up.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>“How did I do?” Rey asked Ben once they were in his van, waving to the Antilles family as they pulled out into the street. Ben’s mother Leia, having come in her own car, had already left. Rose agreed to take Mala home in the Beetle, though neither girl was ready to leave yet.</p>
<p>“She likes you. She didn’t say it outright, but I know her well enough to read her body language.” At the edge of the main road, Ben turned left toward Chesapeake Beach instead of right and home. Rey didn’t question the change in direction; she was happy to spend as much time alone with Ben as possible.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry your dad couldn’t make it.”</p>
<p>Ben grimaced. “Just as well. He’d have spent the whole evening arguing with Wedge, and me, about the war,” he said. “He’s probably out with my uncle at Kenobi’s Pub. Big cop hangout.”</p>
<p>“Your dad’s a cop, too?”</p>
<p>“Early retired, injured on the job,” Ben said. “Though if he’d been the one to catch us at the beach the other day, he’d have hauled us in on a citizen’s arrest.”</p>
<p>Message loud and clear. Rey remembered Ben’s journal passages covering disagreements with his parents, thinking of how his mother seemed more sympathetic to Ben’s activism. She was a society lady, he revealed in a few passages, whose parents thought she married beneath her. Leia had been a gracious guest this evening, and warm with Rey.</p>
<p>The lights they passed on the two-lane road, shining into the van, illuminated Ben’s profile. He looked serious, and Rey got it into her head that he no longer wanted to talk about his family. They drove in silence for the duration, when Ben turned into the entrance of the state park. It had a different name here than in Rey’s original present… or should she call that the future now? It wouldn’t be her present until she reached it the old fashioned way.</p>
<p>“You mind if we park a while?” Ben asked, pulling up to the registration booth. He gave his name and a few bills to the attendant and received a parking pass in return.</p>
<p><em>Not at all.</em> Rey looked forward to more private time on the beach. The sky was clear tonight, too, and full of stars. A romantic setting for the two of them. She turned in her seat and searched the darkness for the beach towels, when she realized Ben was driving deeper into the wooded area and the primitive campground.</p>
<p>He parked the van in a bare bones lot and killed the engine. “You like marshmallows?”</p>
<p>“I love marshmallows.”</p>
<p>Ben got out of the van and opened the back. When Rey followed suit she took the paper grocery bag offered to her while he lugged several cut shards of wood to the stone-lined fire pit in the sand. He opened the van’s side door and set up a curtain of mosquito netting to keep out the critters. “I have some repellant if you need it,” he said. “It doesn’t get too bad out here, but just in case…”</p>
<p>Rey considered it, but remembered any repellant in the Sixties might have a higher concentration of DEET than she was used to. She said she’d take her chances, and sat on a log by the pit while Ben started the fire. She removed her tights and shoes, tucking them in the van to keep them clean.</p>
<p>In the bag she found a few sodas and the fixings for s’mores. Ben had the remnants of a joint toked over the last few weeks. Just enough to help relax, he said, but Rey was well there without it. She held up her hand when he offered her the glowing roach. “I’m not against it, I’ve never tried it before,” she said. “I don’t want to ruin a good time by coughing all night.”</p>
<p>Ben huffed out a short laugh. “Okay, let’s try this then. Open your mouth and take the smoke in. You’ll know when.” There was enough weed for one last toke -- the ember looked close to burning Ben’s fingertips. He held the smoke within him for a few seconds then, lips still closed, tilted closer to Rey.</p>
<p>He blew a stream of pungent smoke directly into her mouth, and Rey took it deep. She tried not to cough when Ben’s lips touched lightly down on hers, and when she pushed out the air she sealed her mouth over his. A shotgun kiss, she believed it was called. She’d know its potency soon enough.</p>
<p>They cuddled on an army blanket before the fire, faces sticky with melting sweets, messing up their nice clothes. Gradually they released buttons from their holdings and they spread the marshmallow and chocolate residue to other places. Ben opened the front of her dress to free her breasts, and smeared some of his dessert on one of her nipples before licking it away.</p>
<p>Rey had a hot mess of browned marshmallow and dripping chocolate pinched in her fingers between two crumbling crackers. She managed one bite before Ben laid her down on the blanket, kissing along her collarbone. The rest of her snack ended up somewhere on his back when she chose to grab him instead of hold onto it.</p>
<p>“Let’s move into the van,” he suggested, palming one large hand over her breast. They left their clothes behind and the fire smoldering, and slipped past the netting. Ben had Rey spreadeagle first on the back bench while he knelt in front of her. He hooked her legs over his shoulders and, after a minute or so kissing the insides of her thighs, inched closer to her pussy.</p>
<p>“Huh,” he said, “you shave down here?” He licked some of the sticky off his fingers and stroked her nether lips.</p>
<p>“Sometimes.” Rey bucked her hips forward. It hadn’t occurred to her that less hair might be a turnoff, this being an era of different sensibilities. “I’ll grow it out if you want.”</p>
<p>“You do what you want. I’ll have you any way I can get you,” he said. Right now, though, he wasn’t taking it. Ben stared, as though awed, all the while her clit pulsed and her core ached.</p>
<p>Unable to stand it, she reached down and touched herself, hoping to motivate him. That seemed to capture his attention more than wanting to give it to her.</p>
<p>Ben rested his cheek on her thigh, inhaling her scent. “You like to play with yourself? Put your fingers in, let me see.”</p>
<p>Rey dragged her two forefingers down her pussy and slid them into her cunt. She was well past ready for him, yet this power play held some appeal. While she pistoned those fingers, she licked her other forefinger and circled her nipple. That got a groan from him.</p>
<p>“You are so beautiful,” he told her. While she continued, Ben turned up two of his fingers and slid them under hers. “Keep going,” he said, and he fingered her in unison, though from his angle he went a little deeper and she gave a squeeze in response.</p>
<p>“Ben, I need more than this,” she said. She pulled out and brushed her fingers on his lips. Ben sucked them in and she whined. <em>Taste it...all for you.</em> Ben split her fingers apart with his tongue, swirling it around each one before finally grasping her hip to eat her out.</p>
<p>“Fuck, yes!” Rey reared her head back and grasped either side of the seat back. Ben went down hard on her, and rapidly brushed his tongue over her clit while working nearly his entire hand in and out. His hunger stirred hers; her lower body quivered and she watched him go like a man starved. She focused on the rough bristles of his mustache scratching her clitoral hood, and when he came up for air briefly to rub his slight beard against a tender spot she tried not to jar him away.</p>
<p>“You taste so good,” he said, then went back for more. The low growl in his throat sounded feral. Eaten alive in the woods...Rey damn near howled at the moon when she came.</p>
<p>Ben didn’t give her time to recover when he pulled her off the seat to turn her around. “This way.” He guided her to kneel on the mattress, bent over the seat. Rey pushed her ass up and spread her knees, keening when he slapped her flesh.</p>
<p>“Do that again,” she said, panting.</p>
<p>Ben leaned over, pressing against her back for a moment. He smelled like her, with notes of chocolate and sugar. She couldn’t resist; she turned and pushed forward for a kiss. “You got a kink, huh?” he asked, sounding devilish, and reared back to bring his hand down harder. One, two, three smacks and she filled the van with her sharp cries. Ben rubbed her sore bottom with both hands to spread the heat, then nudged her with his hips.</p>
<p>Rey felt his hard cock tapping on her. “Ben,” she said on a whine. Seconds later, she was clawing the upholstery as he filled her. Thick, raw, rough...they were beyond fucking. This was rutting to break the van’s suspension.</p>
<p>It didn’t even bother her that he’d gone in without a condom, and she’d done nothing to protect herself, either. She’d worry later. She couldn’t think for Ben pounding into her. She hung on for the ride, pushing back to meet his every thrust.</p>
<p>“Ben,” she called out some time later. It was the only intelligible word she got out while they fucked.</p>
<p>“I’m coming,” he told her. “Hang on, I just...”</p>
<p>Rey braced for that final push, but instead felt something wet and warm spray her lower back. Ben had pulled out, coming with deep grunts as he finished himself off. Another scent to mingle with the rest; any other person might suffocate from it, but Rey took it all in.</p>
<p>Ben leaned over again, calmer now, and kissed her shoulder, then her neck. “Don’t move,” he whispered.</p>
<p>“I don’t think I can,” she said, starting to laugh.</p>
<p>It was contagious; he joined in. “I’m serious. I put my glasses on the seat and they slid off. I can’t find them.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Back by the fire, still undressed, they lay together on the blanket and watched the flames. “How are you doing?” Rey asked.</p>
<p>“I really want a smoke, but I don’t have the strength to light up,” he said.</p>
<p>“So don’t.” Rey placed her hand on his bare hip, tracing the hard line of muscle.</p>
<p>“I suppose skipping one won’t kill me.” Ben nestled closer and kissed the top of her head.</p>
<p>“Skipping more might help.” <em>Damn it.</em> Soon as the words spilled free Rey regretted them. She hadn’t intended to turn into a nag, especially during the afterglow.</p>
<p>Ben drew himself up into a sitting position, leaning against the sitting log. “I know they’re not good for me, but I can’t apologize for it. I love smoking. I’ve been smoking since I was thirteen.”</p>
<p>It shouldn’t have surprised Rey. She’d seen a cigarette in his mother’s hand after dinner. He’d grown up around smoke; it was as natural as drinking water. “Why do you love it?”</p>
<p>The answer took a few seconds to come. “It’s something to do,” Ben said. “It keeps me from punishing my body in other ways. I don’t drop acid or drink much. Cigs don’t cost a lot of money.” He let out a short laugh. “I probably love smoking as much as I love my job. And sex.”</p>
<p>“And you can smoke while you work,” Rey said. “Double your pleasure.” She sat next to him. “What if you could replace cigarettes with sex?”</p>
<p>“<em>The Rebellion</em> would fold because I’d be too busy fucking.” Ben kissed her.</p>
<p>Rey held out her hand. “Give me your cigs.” Ben had left the pack in his shirt pocket; she would lock them in her purse. “Not saying you have to go cold turkey, but maybe I can help you cut down. Every time you want a cigarette, and don’t you go buying more of these, you come to me. I’ll give you a choice. The cigarette or…”</p>
<p>“Or…?” Ben asked.</p>
<p>Rey reached between his thighs and took hold of his cock. She slid her thumb up and down a raised vein, then around the tip. “Or…”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Chapter 20</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>cw // discussion of birth control</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Thursday, July 18, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>To Ben’s credit, he was trying. Over the course of the week, he had come to Rey seven times wanting a cigarette. He got one.</p>
<p>The eighth request came on the drive back from the printers, after dropping off the sheets for the July 22nd issue. Rey had been especially proud of her interview with an acquaintance of Ben’s, a high school teacher who’d seen a number of her students drafted. For the next issue, she planned to interview Mala to get the perspective of a woman who coped with her sweetheart at war.</p>
<p>Rey had Ben pull the Samba off the road near a large strawberry patch. She unbuckled his jeans and blew him in the driver’s seat. The car was hot as all hell with the AC off and only the front windows open for relief, but Ben’s threading his fingers through her hair and dusting down her back helped alleviate some of her discomfort. It didn’t take long for him to come, and after she swallowed she very gently tucked him back into place.</p>
<p>“If it helps any,” she said, nuzzling his ear, “the less you smoke, the better you taste.”</p>
<p>“I’ll keep that in mind.” Ben turned his head out toward the strawberry field. A wooden booth stood to one side of it, bearing a sign advertising <em>Pick Your Own</em>. “Want some?” he asked.</p>
<p>“It’s on me.” Rey pulled a few dollars out of her purse. “The boss man at the newspaper paid me the other day.” All the volunteers at <em>The Rebellion</em> were thrilled to be earning money for their work now. The commission Rose had earned on Gial Ackbar especially boosted her confidence. She’d taken to dressing better on the days she canvassed the Oceanfront for prospects.</p>
<p>Rey was doing well at Eisley’s, too, and she figured it was time to set up a bank account. She wasn’t wholly comfortable with hiding money in Rose’s room, since the house residents rarely locked the place.</p>
<p>They returned to <em>The Rebellion</em> offices with several pints of strawberries, which the girls appreciated. Ben kept one for himself, for later, and made a date with Rey for early breakfast after her shift. “I’ll put these upstairs. I need to dress for a meeting.” With a peck on the lips he disappeared, leaving Rey to the collective gush from her peers.</p>
<p>Their secret was out, and to Rey’s relief the girls in the office were cool with it...with one notable exception. Yet Bazine was nowhere to be found today. “Poe came in to drop off some photos, and they took off in her car,” Kay told her.</p>
<p>The two women tended to avoid each other lately. “Where’s Rose?”</p>
<p>“At Maz’s for lunch. She’s hoping to sell her some ads.”</p>
<p>Maz’s Corner Store had a lunch counter, and a delicious grilled cheese and soup special. When Rey arrived, she thought to rub her eyes to ensure she was seeing correctly.</p>
<p>Rose and Armitage, both seated at the counter, not fighting. Granted, each had the farthest seat on either end, and Rose’s attention fixed solely on the elderly Maz throughout her pitch. The younger woman waved as Rey took a seat somewhere in the middle. Chewie, Maz’s short order cook, set down a fountain Coke before she even ordered.</p>
<p>“Latest issue off?” Armitage asked her. He’d just finished the fried chicken plate.</p>
<p>“Yes, and it looks great. You’ll see for yourself when we pick it up. I’m riding up with you again, right?”</p>
<p>Armitage raised an eyebrow. “Your boyfriend cool with that?”</p>
<p>“Why should he mind? Ben doesn’t own me, and I don’t own him,” Rey said. She nodded when Chewie set down her lunch. “I like riding out to Pungo with you. It gets noisy in the van sometimes with all the people.”</p>
<p>“I suppose the real question is, are you cool with Bazine riding up with Ben?”</p>
<p>Rey tore off a chunk of sandwich and dipped it in her tomato soup. “I trust Ben.”</p>
<p>“Because Ben’s a good guy.” This from Rose, who landed on the stool next to Rey’s. She took the rest of the torn half of Rey’s sandwich.</p>
<p>Rey gave her friend a look to convey a plea. <em>So is Armitage</em>, she transmitted, but whether Rose got the message was unclear. The young woman announced she had to go back to <em>The Rebellion</em> for an ad contract. Another sale.</p>
<p>When she left, Armitage told Rey, “I should have asked you out when I had the chance.”</p>
<p>Rey had the second triangular sandwich in her hand, and leaned it against her soup bowl. Armitage hovered over his plate, idly picking bits of crisp chicken off the bones. These didn’t seem like the right words for a man who’d spent a night out with one sister while watching the other one. “I’m flattered, Armitage, but I’m not the only girl in town.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.”</p>
<p>Rey noticed a folded paper underneath Armitage’s plate. He caught her staring, and pulled out the pamphlet for the police academy. “You’re thinking of signing up?” she asked.</p>
<p>Armitage looked at her, surprised. “You’re not going to call me a pig in training, like Rose did earlier?”</p>
<p>“Do you want to be a police officer?”</p>
<p>“I want to make a better living than I am right now.” Armitage unfolded the pamphlet and looked down at the photo of an officer in dress blues, authoritative and clean cut. “I don’t have money for college, I can’t join the military, what other options are there?”</p>
<p>Rey dipped the other half of her sandwich. “What would you study if you could go to school?”</p>
<p>“Law.” The answer came immediately. “I love the law,” he said. “I read every book I can find on it.”</p>
<p>“Sounds like you're halfway there. You haven’t considered just taking classes when you can, seeing as how you work nights and can fit them in?”</p>
<p>Armitage gave a bitter laugh. “At that rate, the way my money goes, I’ll be fifty by the time I’m done.”</p>
<p>Rey scooped up the last of her soup, set down Chewie’s tip, and grabbed her bill. “You might, but at least you’d be a fifty-year-old with a law degree as opposed to just being a fifty-year-old man,” she said, and patted his shoulder as she stood. “See you Sunday if not before then.”</p>
<p>She heard Chewie’s gruff chuckle as she walked to the front to pay, but didn’t turn around. Armitage needed to think about his future. She hoped whatever path he took ended well for him. She didn’t know exactly when he would die, either, but wondered if anything she set in motion here might give him a few more years.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>For dinner, the roommates grilled burgers in the front yard. Everybody sat in lawn chairs -- all with Cokes, some with cigs -- and hollered a conversation across the street with the neighbors. Rey moved her chair next to Rose’s for a quieter side discussion.</p>
<p>“I need to get the Pill,” she whispered.</p>
<p>Rose kept a poker face, and tapped some ash onto the ground. “Okay. You get your period yet?”</p>
<p>“I’m due soon.” She hoped it came on time. The pullout method wasn’t exactly foolproof.</p>
<p>“Cool, so you know how and when to take them. I got a three-month supply. I’ll give you some,” Rose said.</p>
<p>Rey wasn’t certain how it worked in 1968. Rose’s prescription might not have the potency she needed. “I was thinking you could drive me to a clinic.”</p>
<p>“I can. Or…” Rose sipped her Coke, “Ben could take some responsibility and buy some rubbers.” She looked at Rey, then said, “Yeah, it’s none of my business, is it?”</p>
<p>“I thought you knew everything that goes on in this town.” Rey smiled at her.</p>
<p>“I do now.” Rose accepted a paper plate with her burger from Paige, as did Rey. “So when’s the big date?”</p>
<p>“It already happened. I --”</p>
<p>A loud clunk from the grill startled her. Rey looked up and guessed that Paige had brought down her stainless steel spatula with too much force. The older Tico sister turned slowly to glare at Rey, then recovered quickly. “We’re out of pickles,” she said, and abandoned the remaining patties on the smoldering grill for the front door.</p>
<p>“What’s eating her?” asked Kay between bites.</p>
<p>Rey remembered what Paige had said in 2018, and handed Rose her plate. “I’ll be right back.”</p>
<p>In the kitchen, Paige wasn’t looking for hamburger fixings but sitting at the table, cooling off. Rey approached slowly, calling her name and asking after her.</p>
<p>“You are in a relationship with Ben Solo, did I hear that right?” Paige demanded. “I know there was a bit of flirting, but everybody does that with him.”</p>
<p>“I am. It’s not really a secret.” Of course, with Paige working full-time and rarely around, how would she know unless Rose said something. This must have been the one news item missed.</p>
<p>“Bazine is my friend,” Paige said.</p>
<p>“I have nothing against Bazine,” Rey said. “I would have liked to be her friend, too, but --”</p>
<p>“But you chose to steal her man,” Paige cut in. She yanked open the fridge and grabbed a can of beer.</p>
<p>“It wasn’t like that. Ben was not her boyfriend when we met.” Her words hit an unmovable wall. Paige’s expression didn’t soften.</p>
<p>“That’s not what she told me, Rey. She and Ben run <em>The Rebellion</em> together. She warned me you might be bad news, but Rose likes you and you got a job right away, so I gave you the benefit of the doubt.” Paige shook her head. “You just don’t do things like that, though.”</p>
<p>Bazine, running <em>The Rebellion</em>? The woman was doing a number on Paige; it amazed her how the two sisters had different perspectives on this situation. Rey explained her position again, but Paige wasn’t hearing it. Paige and Bazine had history, and that trumped any affection Rose had for Rey.</p>
<p>“Have you thought to ask Ben what he thinks?” Rey asked.</p>
<p>“Of course he’s going to side with you,” Paige said. “Where did you even come from? No ID, no money… it’s like you appeared out of thin air and inserted yourself into our lives.”</p>
<p>She called it. Rey had no rebuttal for that.</p>
<p>Paige took the pickle jar, drumming her fingers on the lid. “I can’t tell Rose she can’t be friends with you anymore, but my name is on the lease and I can strongly suggest that you find a new place to live,” she said. “We’re violating the terms as it is, since we can’t have more than four people living here at one time.”</p>
<p>Rey’s body turned cold. She took this to mean Paige wanted to have her friend over once in a while, and Rey’s presence prevented that.</p>
<p>“Can I at least have a few days?” she asked. “I’m off Monday. I’ll look then.”</p>
<p>Paige accepted that and pushed past her to the door. Rey took the chair she left, and put her head down.</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Friday, July 19, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“Come stay with me. Problem solved.” Ben reached over Rey’s plate for the ketchup bottle.</p>
<p>“You’re not bothered that Bazine is going around telling people that I broke the two of you up?”</p>
<p>Ben shrugged. “You didn’t. I know the truth, so do you, and that’s all that matters. People already think I’m a lazy bum and a traitor for not serving my country, and they’re wrong. I do serve it, my way,” he said. “Being called a cheater is actually tame compared to other names people have hurled at me.”</p>
<p>They were sitting at the counter of an all-night diner down the street from Eisley’s. A number of patrons and staff ended up here when the club closed. Rey, rattled from the day’s events and a grueling shift, didn’t bother to completely change after work. She slipped her shorts on over her bunny outfit; Ben wore her ears.</p>
<p>“You look ridiculous,” she told him, but it came out high pitched with laughter.</p>
<p>Ben smiled at her, as he dressed up his hamburger. “I’m merely solidifying my position on equal rights,” he said. “Eisley’s objectifies their female staff with these costumes, so it’s only fair their lady patrons should also see me as a plaything.”</p>
<p>“Gay men, too, I suppose.”</p>
<p>Ben nodded, swallowing a large bite. “That’s a different club, but the location changes. You have to be in the know.”</p>
<p>It made sense. He didn’t have to tell Rey the reason why. To avoid police raids, likely, and the inevitable naming and shaming in the local paper. Stonewall in New York hadn’t happened yet, but she imagined it was as bad here. She stabbed a French fry into a puddle of ketchup on her plate. “Why can’t people live and let live?” she wondered aloud. “Love is love is love.”</p>
<p>“I like that,” Ben said.</p>
<p>“Thanks. I can’t take credit for it.” She waited for their server to refill their drinks, then asked, “You don’t think it’s too soon for me to move in?”</p>
<p>Ben side-eyed her. “How long have we known each other?”</p>
<p>“Since the fifth.”</p>
<p>“What happened nine days after the fifth?” he asked.</p>
<p><em>Yeah.</em> She wouldn’t have changed a thing, though. “If you don’t mind my asking, have you acted so quickly in the past?”</p>
<p>Ben downed the rest of his meal before answering, but he was shaking his head as he wiped his napkin over his face. “I’ve never been so certain in my life about something like this before. Including <em>The Rebellion</em>. When I started it two years ago, I thought I’d be lucky to last three months. Now we could finish the decade strong.”</p>
<p>“You don’t plan to continue indefinitely?”</p>
<p>“I used to think <em>The Rebellion</em> would end when the war ended, meaning I’ve done my job.” Ben signaled for the check.</p>
<p><em>The Rebellion</em> ended in the early-Seventies, she knew, but did it have to? “There are other causes,” Rey said. “That gay bar, for example. People want a safe space to be themselves. Why is it okay for oversexed, heterosexual businessmen to grab my ass at Eisley’s, yet two men attracted to each other can’t dance without the weight of public disapproval bearing down upon them?”</p>
<p>The server had come by as she spoke, and paused. Rey met the young man’s gaze for a second, surprised to receive a smile and a nod. <em>Right on</em>, he seemed to transit to her.</p>
<p>“Did you just write your next editorial?” asked Ben.</p>
<p>“Did I?” Words flooded her mind. She had one of the office pens in her purse. She grabbed a paper napkin and jotted down some notes.</p>
<p>Ben turned in his stool and rested his chin on her shoulder. “Why don’t we take this home?” he suggested. “I have actual paper.”</p>
<p>She liked the way he said <em>home</em>. Rey consented, already planning to pick up her meager belongings at Rose’s when the hour turned decent. For now, she was content to lay in bed, using Ben’s bare back as a writing desk while she drafted her next piece for <em>The Rebellion</em>.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. Chapter 21</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>cw // smoking; unprotected sex, pullout, it gets messy</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Saturday, July 20, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“Rey,” Ben said, spooning her in bed, “I need one.”</p>
<p>Rey snuggled deeper under the sheets. She rubbed her backside against him, relishing how his morning hard-on nudged her ass. “One what?”</p>
<p>“A smoke, Rey. Wake up and give me a cigarette.”</p>
<p>Rey opened her eyes. It was early yet, and not quite light out. The bedside clock read a few minutes after six. She checked her watch; Mickey’s arms had stopped around four. <em>I keep forgetting to wind this.</em></p>
<p><em>The Rebellion</em>-sponsored protest wasn’t scheduled until the early afternoon, and they were all supposed to be there an hour before to set up. They’d only gone to sleep a few hours ago. Nicotine had a hold on her poor man.</p>
<p>She rolled over and kissed him, morning breath be damned. Taking hold of his hard cock, she stroked her thumb over the tip. “Or…?”</p>
<p>“Can’t I have both, just this one time?”</p>
<p>One look into his soft, dark eyes -- visible once her vision adjusted in the dim -- and Rey was sunk. Perhaps sleep still had too strong a hold on her for her to refuse him. She lay back and offered herself, and Ben positioned his hips in the cradle of her open thighs. Their lovemaking happened slowly at first, with no words passed between them, only deep and urgent kisses. Just under a week since consummating their relationship, Rey had quickly picked up on his rhythms and vocal cues.</p>
<p>She knew what he liked and when to back down, based on the pitch of every moan. The harder he pounded into her, the sooner he’d come. Rey prepared for the eventual pullout; soon, but not before Ben saw to her pleasure.</p>
<p>He licked his fingers and reached down to rub her clit while he fucked her. “Where do you want it?” he asked, his voice gruff.</p>
<p>“Come on my tits.”</p>
<p>Good choice. His grin slayed her and he put the pressure on her clit. Soon as she caught her breath after climaxing he jerked free and straddled her, aiming for her bustline. <em>Fuck, yes.</em> This was so wanton and she never wanted it to end. Rey massaged his cum into her breasts, spreading the warmth. When Ben licked a long path along one curve, taking some of it with him, he kissed her hard and thrilled her.</p>
<p>His mustache was wet with it, and she kissed it away. She loved being dirty with him.</p>
<p>“Can I have my smoke now?” he begged.</p>
<p>“I might just join you this time.” Rey had never smoked a cig in her life, but it seemed as good a time to experience the post-sex smoke and see what was all the fuss. They both sat up in bed and lit up, Rey coughing more than puffing.</p>
<p>Ben blew out a long, curling stream before taking Rey’s cig and setting it to smolder on the ashtray in his lap. “Here. I don’t need you turning all green on me today,” he said. “Thanks for this.” He held up his. “I promise I’ll behave later this week.”</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Rey asked.</p>
<p>Ben shook his head. “No.” When prompted, he added, “It’s the speech, it’s all wrong.”</p>
<p>He jammed the cigarette between his lips, put on his glasses, and got out of bed. He returned from the back room with a legal pad, on which he’d written his latest draft. “It’s all shit. I’m not saying what notes you gave me were worthless,” he rejoined, squeezing her hand, “but this reads like something you recite at a school assembly. There’s no soul here.”</p>
<p>Rey asked to see this version, and read through the three pages filled with ink. He’d practically rewritten it, and she didn’t recognize anything here from the archival footage she and Mon had vetted for the exhibit. “Ben, have you always written your speeches out beforehand?” she asked. “Do you have one saved you could retool?”</p>
<p>“No. This was the first time I wrote everything out. All those other times, I was fifth or six down the list of speakers and had little time anyway. This is my demonstration today.” Other speakers were scheduled, but Ben was headlining, so to speak. “I can’t go up there talking like a geography teacher. I’ll lose them.”</p>
<p>Ben finished his cigarette and was now eyeing the rest of Rey’s. As a pre-emptive move, she grabbed it and faked a puff. “There’s still time, Ben. Think of what you said at previous demonstrations, you know. Pinpoint what grabbed people, what influenced them to ask you to come back.”</p>
<p>She cleared the bed before they ended up setting it on fire. “Why do you oppose this war, Ben?”</p>
<p>“What good is war, Rey?” Ben held his pillow to his chest and bear-hugged it. “It’s needless destruction. It’s motivated by greed. It scorches the earth. Years from now, anyone in Vietnam who survives will lose more years rebuilding, and lose faith in humanity in general because the Americans will all have gone home to deal with their own shit here.”</p>
<p>Rey thought of Wedge, and what struggles he might face in the coming months and years. Not related to his physical disability, either. The guilt, the nightmares. He had a support system at home to help, where not all veterans did. “The first time I rode down with Armitage to Pungo, he went on and on about Communist infiltration,” she said. “I got the impression he’d go to Vietnam if allowed.”</p>
<p>“He’d come back in a box,” Ben said. “Armitage may act tough, but you haven’t seen him with his brothers. He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”</p>
<p>She’d like to see that. Armitage ought to be a lawyer, helping families like his own. “His perspective is different than yours, Ben. The people he hangs with… all the men are here. You, Poe…” Who knew Poe’s story, why he hadn’t been drafted? Rey guessed his lottery number hadn’t come up yet.</p>
<p>Ben slowly nodded. “That’s right. He doesn’t have much family, but he has nobody over there. I do.” He looked at her, and the warmth radiating from his gaze struck her. Ben leaned over for a gentle kiss. “I’m so glad you’re here. Come live with me, Rey. This was pretty whirlwind, but it’s meant to be. You feel that, right?”</p>
<p>“Yes.” How nice it would be to live in this house with Ben in 2018.</p>
<p>Before Rey could suggest sharing the shower, though, the loud whack of the downstairs screen door hitting its jamb startled them. Rey’s first thought was of Bazine, preparing to stomp up to the second floor to confront them. It came as pure relief, therefore, when Rose’s shrill call interrupted their kiss.</p>
<p>“Rey! Are you here?”</p>
<p>“I really wanted a shower,” Rey whispered.</p>
<p>Ben gave her a sympathetic smile. “Go take it. I’ll stall her.” He kissed her nose and took a pair of jeans with him on the way out.</p>
<p>When she came down to the office area, clean and dressed, Ben was sitting at the mailing table with Rose, her face red and sniffling. Ben had an arm around her, his face pressed against her temple.</p>
<p>“What’s wrong?” Rey’s heart felt heavy.</p>
<p>“Rey, I’m so sorry for what happened.” Rose pointed to a green garbage bag on the floor, tied off in a thick knot. “That’s all your stuff. I put all your money in a coffee can in there, too, and made sure Paige didn’t take any. You don’t owe her anything if she’s kicking you out.”</p>
<p>Rey thanked her and moved the bag to the foot of the stairs. She trusted Rose to have gotten what little she had from the house. “I hoped to tell you today, Rose. I was too late getting home and didn’t want to wake anybody.” She came to sit on the young woman’s other side, and rubbed her back.</p>
<p>“She wouldn’t listen to me.” Rose’s words came out halted, between tears. “Kept going on about Bazine and how she was ‘betrayed.’” Rose used finger quotes for the last word. “She took Bazine’s word over mine, her own sister!”</p>
<p>Ben looked over Rose’s bent head at Rey. “I told Rose I’ve banned Bazine from the house. I’ll get the word out. If she comes to the protest today, whatever, but she doesn’t set one foot in here again.”</p>
<p>Rey said nothing, but nodded. The enormity of her presence here weighed on her head and heart. She hadn’t come to make enemies, but getting close to Ben contributed to this situation. She only hoped Bazine found happiness elsewhere.</p>
<p>“And I’m moving out, too,” Rose said. “I’m making money now. I’m getting a hotel and will stay there until I get my own pad. If I have to find a second job to stay afloat I will.”</p>
<p>“Rose, no.” Rey hugged her. “I don’t want you estranged from your sister. There’s enough heartache in the world now, and you two need each other,” she said. “And Paige did have a point. My being there was violating the lease.”</p>
<p>“That’s bullshit! We’ve had people sleeping on the couch for months and she never said a word.”</p>
<p>“Was Bazine one of those people?”</p>
<p>Rose was quiet a moment, and soon she confirmed it.</p>
<p>“Rose, at the very least give it a day. I’m less than five minutes away if you need me. I’m not leaving town,” Rey said. “We need you at a hundred percent for the demonstration today.”</p>
<p>Rose straightened in her seat, perking up a bit. “I’ve already got my sign made,” she said, and looked at Ben. “You know, what would make me feel better is if I got to meet Roger Daltrey.”</p>
<p>Ben stroked his scruffy chin. “It would make any woman feel better, I imagine. I have to get showered,” he said, and took Rey’s bag upstairs with him.</p>
<p>“Well,” Rose said, sagging, “at least I still have my ticket for the show.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Chapter 22</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes: talk about war casualties</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Rey eyeballed the crowd gathered in front of the concert venue at a few hundred. She wasn’t certain of the venue’s capacity, as it didn’t exist in 2018. The Who’s concert was sold out, she’d been told, and pretty much everybody except her and Ben were going after the demonstration.</p>
<p>“I’ve seen The Who live already,” Ben said when asked. “They about blew my ears off. Once is enough.” At least he’d gotten to see the original lineup, arguably in their prime. Rey had no such luck with many of the classic bands of this era.</p>
<p>People on both sides of the Vietnam issue had gathered for the pre-concert event. Waving poster board signs implored people to make love, not war. Excited chatter roared over the words of the first two speakers invited to precede Ben. Kay’s boyfriend, today’s one-man sound crew, struggled to keep the equipment working so the speeches could be heard.</p>
<p>Rey spotted Poe milling through the crowd, which grew as the day progressed, snapping photos. “Hell of a turnout, for this town, anyway,” he said.</p>
<p>“Not bad,” Ben said. His tone suggested he’d hoped for a bigger showing. Rey believed he’d get his wish -- more and more people gathered at the periphery of the crowd. Some walking purposely toward them, others curious passersby.</p>
<p>“How about a picture?” Poe offered. Rey adjusted her sunglasses and clung to Ben’s side as Poe took the shot that she’d find in Ben’s journal. This time she’d ask for a larger print to frame.</p>
<p>Somebody tapped on Ben’s shoulder and requested his assistance with the program. “I’ll catch up,” Rey said and went off with Poe. She wanted to find Rose; they’d gotten separated when they arrived. She did see Bazine and Paige together in the crowd, and decided to avoid them.</p>
<p>She found Rose in a clearing on the sidewalk, holding a sign that read <em>PEACE NOW</em> with the peace sign as the <em>O</em>. It was happening, the famous fight between Rose and Armitage that Poe would immortalize.</p>
<p>“Get some pictures,” she said, as a nudge, then stood back to watch the fireworks. Armitage was backed by a small group Rey learned was part of a young Republicans organization. They stood out among the hippie-dressed crowd in their short haircuts, slacks and ties. The girls from <em>The Rebellion</em> office, sans Bazine, stood with Rose while she said her piece.</p>
<p>“Seventy thousand people, as of last year, died in this war,” Rose was saying, “and that’s just Americans. And for what? Do you honestly believe that’s a fair trade off to stem the tide of Communism?”</p>
<p>“Nearly twenty million soldiers gave their lives to stop Hitler,” Armitage countered.</p>
<p>Rose’s mouth gaped for a moment, but she quickly recovered. “I really hope you’re not suggesting not <em>enough</em> people are dying…”</p>
<p>“You think it makes me happy to see more names in the newspaper every day, Rose?” Armitage shouted back. “You think I want to read down those lists and see the name of somebody I know? I don’t.”</p>
<p>Rose pursed her lips, as though bursting to interrupt.</p>
<p>“I know war isn’t fun. It’s not a game. It was necessary for us to go to war twenty-five years ago to preserve our way of life.” The people behind Armitage applauded.</p>
<p>“Why is it necessary now?” Rose demanded. “Why is violence the only solution for stopping the Red Menace?”</p>
<p>“I don’t know!” Armitage looked unsure of what to say next. Rey watched his face turn pink -- maybe his frustration, maybe the heat. “Maybe it’s because begging for peace and talking only gets one so far. The other side attacks, you have to react.”</p>
<p>“There are different ways one can react,” Rose said. “You turn the other cheek, you can stun your opponent into trying a different tactic that’s not aggression.”</p>
<p>“You think so?” Armitage asked. “Funny. It never worked with you.”</p>
<p><em>What?</em> The gasp that rippled through the surrounding crowd swept past Rey, shuddering her skin.</p>
<p>Rose lowered her sign, staring blankly at Armitage. He took a step closer. Poe readied his camera.</p>
<p>“How long have we been fighting, Rose, over every conceivable topic in existence?” he asked. “I’ve tried the peaceful interactions with you, and they never worked. Seems the only way we can communicate is if we’re fighting and insulting each other.”</p>
<p>“What?” Rose looked around the crowd, presumably for an ally to have her back. “What are you saying?”</p>
<p>“I’m saying,” Armitage was centimeters from her now, “that you, Rose Tico, have a very big mouth.”</p>
<p>And he crushed his equally big mouth over hers.</p>
<p>Rey let out a loud cry, but it drowned in the crowd’s reaction. People whistled and cheered, others expressed surprise. Rose merely stared at Armitage when he broke free, clearly too stunned to retort. It was as if the kiss had doused the fire.</p>
<p>Rose dropped her sign and took off running. Armitage called after her and followed. Rey was about to do the same when Poe tugged at her arm. “Let her go, she’s fine,” he said. “Ben’s about to come on.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>The top step leading into the concert venue served as the stage. A singer with an acoustic guitar, who’d volunteered bumper music for the event, had just finished leading the crowd in The Youngbloods’ “Get Together.” The energy produced from many voices united in song had pumped up the atmosphere, and Ben was about to step into the forefront and ride that wave.</p>
<p>He was introduced to rousing applause and encouragement. Rey pushed through the crowd to the front, ensuring he would see her. He did; Ben gave her a small smile and waited for the noise to die down before speaking.</p>
<p>Ben held the microphone close to his chin, obscuring his beard from Rey’s view, and pointed toward the beach with his other hand. “If you walk that way for about four or five blocks, you’re going to walk right into the Atlantic Ocean,” he said. “That’s where I learned to swim. That’s where a lot of you learned to swim, I’m sure. Those of you who didn’t sneak into the Cavalier Hotel pool after hours.” He panned the crowd with his pointing finger. “Y’all know who you are,” he added to a ripple of laughter.</p>
<p>“My cousin Jacen learned to swim in the ocean. I know because I taught him,” he continued. “I was nine years old when he was born, and I remember the day my aunt and uncle brought him home from the hospital.”</p>
<p>Ben curved his free arm to mimic cradling a child. “He was this tiny, red sausage of a human being. Eyes pinched shut, face all wrinkled. He looked like somebody had wrapped Mr. Magoo in a tight blanket.” He laughed. “My Aunt Mara let me hold him, and he didn’t squirm. I swear I was the first person he smiled at. He was the first baby I ever held in my arms, and I fell in love with him that day. I don’t have any siblings, but on that day I became a big brother.”</p>
<p>Rey looked back at the crowd. Ben had them in his cradled arm as well.</p>
<p>“When Jacen was five and I was fourteen, he would run straight into the ocean. Like to scare my Aunt Mara to death, but Jacen wasn’t afraid. Nobody had taught him to be afraid of the ocean, or of the strong tides and the possibility they might sweep you away. I taught Jacen to swim, to do everything, without fear,” Ben said, ticking off the memories on his fingers. “I taught him to ride a bike, I taught him to hit a baseball. When I got my license I let him sit on my lap and steer the car. Hell, I taught him to smoke, but don’t tell my Aunt Mara that.”</p>
<p>More laughter. Ben paused, right in the pose that became the wall cling for the museum’s exhibit. Rey couldn’t see Poe in the crowd. Was he getting that shot?</p>
<p>“I would love for all of you to meet my cousin...my little brother Jacen,” Ben said, looking up. Rey saw the tears shining in his eyes. “He is not here. He is in Vietnam. I can’t tell you where in Vietnam, because we haven’t heard from him. We do not know where he is, what he is doing...if he is even alive.</p>
<p>“The only thing I know is the last thing he said to me before he left,” Ben said. His voice began to crack; the crowd had turned dead silent. “He said, ‘I’m not afraid, Ben.’ His number came up, not long after his eighteenth birthday, and he was put on a plane to a foreign country. He’d never been out of Virginia before then, and he wasn’t afraid to go.”</p>
<p>Rey put a foot on one step, moving closer.</p>
<p>“I blame myself for that, for teaching him to never be afraid.” Ben’s gaze panned oceanward. “Since he’s been gone I’ve asked myself many times: if Jacen had experienced any hint of fear early on in his life, would this be different? Would he have resisted when the draft came calling? Would he have reacted to that fear and did something to protect himself? I can’t ask him that because I don’t know <em>where the fuck my brother is</em>!”</p>
<p>The crowd murmured sympathy. Rey’s heart ached for Ben and she longed to rush up to comfort him, but he needed this moment to get his point across. She watched him take a deep breath and continue.</p>
<p>“I ask myself, is he afraid now?” he shouted into the mic. “I spent his whole life teaching him bravery… did I do a good enough job? Did I prepare him for long nights in a fucking jungle, in a fucking monsoon? Did I prepare him to watch for landmines and trip wires? I was asked this morning why I oppose the war. I have many reasons, but first on that list is because this fucking war took my baby brother and <em>I WANT HIM BACK</em>!”</p>
<p>The whole block exploded, the sound causing Rey to stumble, or maybe it was the sudden surge of people pushing forward to hear more. Rey grounded herself to keep from falling, fixing on Ben as he looked down at her. He wasn’t smiling. Tears had formed, but she realized he was looking off to one side, and she followed his gaze to the young girl not a few feet away from her.</p>
<p>Wedge’s sister Syal was sobbing uncontrollably. Wedge was next to her in his chair, holding her hand. That’s when it hit Rey. Jacen and Syal… they were about the same age.</p>
<p>Rey edged closer and in seconds had the girl in her arms. Ben’s voice rang in her ears.</p>
<p>“This war will continue to take your brothers, and your sisters, and your children, and your sweethearts, if it doesn’t end now! It may be too late for my brother, but it’s not too late for yours,” Ben shouted. “It is not too late to bring your families home if you demand it!”</p>
<p>Bodies surrounded Rey and Syal and the air turned thick with sweat and weed smoke. Rey glanced at Wedge, who was urging them up the stairs, quietly bidding Rey to move his sister before the crowd reached a riot stage. Rey had heard the hoarseness taking over Ben’s voice, and with crowd volume peaking it seemed like a good time.</p>
<p>Rey helped Syal take the steps, and when they reached Ben he took them both in his arms. “I got you,” he said to Syal. “I am so sorry. I couldn’t protect him.”</p>
<p>Syal wept on Ben’s shoulder, shaking her head. Rey guessed the young woman wasn’t blaming him. She stretched up to kiss away his tears and he turned his face to capture her lips.</p>
<p>“I love you,” she whispered.</p>
<p>“I love you, too.” Then something, somebody was jerking Ben away.</p>
<p>She’d been so caught up in the moment she hadn’t heard the <em>whoop-whoop</em> of a police siren warning the crowd, or the growing, raging disapproval as two uniformed officers tore Ben from their embrace.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” she shouted at them. One officer was pushing her and Syal back while the other had Ben’s hands behind his back, cuffing him. Ben wasn’t resisting.</p>
<p>“The love-in is over, girlie,” the cop barked at her. “Go on home.”</p>
<p>“This isn’t right. He has a permit to do this.” Rey tried to push past him to get to Ben, but the officer blocked her with a beefy arm. In the distance more black and whites parked on the street, turning the tide of the crowd toward the officers coming out to disperse the event.</p>
<p>Rey looked past the cop toward Ben, who was crooking his head backward. <em>Go home</em>, he seemed to say. <em>Go somewhere safe</em>. She nodded and reached for Syal, who led her back to Wedge.</p>
<p>“This way,” he told her, and together they broke free of the melee, down the street a distance to where fewer people stood. Ben had the keys to the Samba, forcing Rey to leave it there until she could find a spare set, if one existed. Syal had driven here, and Rey helped her get Wedge into the car. Driving home, he reached into the back seat to take Rey’s hand.</p>
<p>“He’ll be fine. Ben’s uncle is a cop. I didn’t see him out there, though, but they aren’t going to hurt him.”</p>
<p>Rey was close to hysterical in her tears, praying for Ben’s safety. His Uncle Luke’s words about Ben not being Mr. Congeniality haunted her.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. On this date, The Who actually did perform in Virginia Beach. However, they performed two shows - one early evening and one late. For the purposes of this story, only one show is implied.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Chapter 23</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Rey searched all of Ben’s drawers and pants pockets. All together, he had about fifty dollars in cash stowed around the house. Combined with what Rose had put in the coffee can for her, hopefully it was enough help Ben make bail.</p>
<p>“Does Ben keep an extra key to the van?” she asked Poe as she came downstairs. “I hope it’s still parked where he left it.”</p>
<p>“Rey,” Poe began.</p>
<p>“Found it!” Rey saw the spare key hanging from a hook in the kitchen and came up to Poe, tucking it and the money into her purse. “Will you drive me up? It’ll take too long to walk. Oh, wait. You don’t have a car.”</p>
<p>“Rey,” Poe said again.</p>
<p>She gave him her attention.</p>
<p>“It’s Saturday, and there’s a big concert in town. Ben’s not going anywhere tonight.”</p>
<p>Her heart plunged. Numb, she fell back on the couch in the main office area.</p>
<p>“My guess is he’ll be locked up until Monday. The way it works around here, you fuck up on a weekend and they’ll make you sit until the next business day to think about what you did.” Poe sat next to her and raised an arm as though to comfort her, but then dropped his hand in his lap.</p>
<p>“He didn’t do anything wrong,” Rey said. “He had a city permit to assemble that rally. Nobody was rioting or destroying anything. It was a largely peaceful demonstration until the cops showed.” Driving away, she’d seen it for herself. When she did reconnect with Rose, she learned that the crowd had indeed dispersed with, as far as could be seen, no other arrests.</p>
<p>The whole thing felt like a setup.</p>
<p>“I know. Ben’s not one to go into something big without a plan,” Poe said. “My guess is they’ll trump up a charge for disturbing the peace. Give him a fine and time served, just to yank his chain.”</p>
<p>Rey buried her face in her hands. Ben had probably long ago posed for his mug shot, and was now sitting in a cramped cell. She didn’t fear for his physical safety -- he was an imposing figure -- but the potential damage of his reputation existed. What if J.B. Hutt and Gial Ackbar decided to pull their ads? The loss of revenue could destroy <em>The Rebellion</em>.</p>
<p>“Can I help you, Rey?” Poe asked.</p>
<p>She shook her head. “I have to get ready for work anyway.” She wondered if Eisley’s would be busy tonight. Maybe everybody would go home after The Who performed, or maybe they’d flood the bar, too keyed up after the concert. She had to work, carry on as normal, though she wasn’t looking forward to coming home to an empty bed.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>A few familiar faces drifted in late, but nobody she knew stayed long. Rose came in for a Coke and to assure Rey that Ben would be fine. “This isn’t the first time the cops hauled him off. He’s told us before not to worry about him, so don’t,” she said.</p>
<p>Rey bussed a table and wiped it down. “I can’t help it. I’ve never been with anybody who’s gotten arrested before.”</p>
<p>“Not even your ex?”</p>
<p><em>Shit</em>. Rey played it cool. “He managed to get away with a lot.”</p>
<p>She listened to Rose gush on about the concert, and when Rose offered to stay over at the house she declined. She wouldn’t be good company; she planned to strip, shower, and sleep once work ended. If she could.</p>
<p>Later on, a lone man at a table in the back flagged her. He looked tired, and had a full head of graying hair. “Sir, this isn’t my station but I’ll get your waitress,” she said, and had turned on her heel when his words stopped her.</p>
<p>“I’m here to talk to you, Rey Burke.”</p>
<p>He had a deep voice, a timbre Rey wondered would become evident in Ben’s voice as he aged. Rey turned back, hesitant when the man offered her the chair opposite him. “I’m on the clock.”</p>
<p>“You won’t get in trouble. I’m Ben’s father,” he said. Han Solo’s jacket had the local police department’s emblem stitched on the breast. He lifted his glass to down the rest of his beer. “I still have a bit of clout around here, despite my retirement.”</p>
<p>Rey held her tray on her lap. “Do you have enough to get Ben out of jail?” Or are you here to warn me off?</p>
<p>“No, but his mother does. Helps to have friends in high places. He should be home soon, if he’s not there already.”</p>
<p>Rey would have hoped to see Ben here first, but didn’t blame him for wanting to go straight to bed. “His Uncle Luke,” she said.</p>
<p>Han’s lip quirked up one side. “Higher than that. Some judge was awakened from his beauty sleep for this.”</p>
<p>“Whoever’s responsible, tell them thanks,” Rey said. Was this all? She glanced at the bar to see her boss looking their way, then at her tables where people weren’t drinking.</p>
<p>“I won’t keep you, Rey. I just wanted to meet you.” Han took out a roll of bills and peeled a few for the table. “My wife seemed taken with you at the Antilles’, and that’s saying something. She’s hard to please, and I understand you wore shoes that night.”</p>
<p>Rey looked down at her bunny suit and stood. “Hopefully she won’t stop in for a nightcap.”</p>
<p>“You’re fine. It would be hypocritical of Leia to disapprove of your...career.” Han Solo’s gaze panned her body, but Rey didn’t feel threatened. “When you get to know her better, ask about how she used to lie about her age to get into speakeasies.” He bade her goodnight and Rey hurried back to her tables, and the subsequent bottom-patting, while counting the minutes until closing.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Sunday, July 21, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Walking back to Ben’s in the early hours, she spotted a figure hunched on the porch steps and quickened her pace. Ben had a cigarette in his hands, and gave her a contrite smile as she came to stand in front of him. “I’m sorry. I really needed this.”</p>
<p>“You think I care about one lousy cigarette, Ben? You were in jail!” She sat next to him and nestled against him. “When did you get home?”</p>
<p>“An hour ago. My hosts were quite reluctant to let me leave,” he said. “Good news is, all charges were dropped. It was a bullshit move done to discourage everybody who attended. My mother pointed it out, the judge agreed, and here we are.”</p>
<p>As well they should. She knew Ben had done everything on the up and up to make that event happen. “You could have come by the bar.”</p>
<p>“You would’ve gotten fired. I’d have carried you out of there to celebrate being sprung.” Ben hugged her close. “I just got out of prison, little girl.”</p>
<p>It got her to laugh. “I didn’t get the chance to tell you how amazing you were today,” she said. His speech had come straight from the heart and it shot into the minds and hearts of everybody there. Ben had put faces on the people fighting this war, and it was up to them to fight to bring those people home.</p>
<p>“You told me everything I wanted to hear today.” Ben pulled Rey onto his lap and pushed up her shirt, exposing her breast. “I love you.”</p>
<p>She loved him back, and she nudged for him to come into the house with her. No sense risking another police officer coming by to scold them. She slid off his lap and they stood to go inside -- Ben the activist and Rey the stray. Only she wasn’t a stray anymore. She had a home.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Chapter 24</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>4/9/21: I thank you for the continued, thought-provoking feedback; it is much appreciated. Due to upcoming commitments with at least two anths, I'm posting the remainder of this work throughout the day. If you've come this far, I hope you will be satisfied with the outcome. </p>
<p>That said, there will be angst and pain and twists coming (but no death) before the happy ending (all my Reylos will end happily for B/R, even if they go through a rough patch).</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Monday, August 5, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>In the midst of a rowdy folding and mailing session, Rey looked up from a stack of newspapers to see two rather shaggy-looking men -- torn jeans, t-shirts, lots of dark and unruly hair -- stride into the main office. Rose didn’t give them a second glance, but Rey paused in addressing one of the papers and rose to greet them.</p>
<p>“Hey, sister.” The taller of the two appraised her with a cool smile. “Ben Solo around?”</p>
<p>“He stepped out for a bit. We’re expecting him soon. I’m his assistant editor, Rey Burke.” They shook hands. Neither man needed to introduce himself. Rey never thought in a million years she’d be talking to Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin.</p>
<p>They declined her offer for coffee, and to wait in Ben’s office. Two of the girls were out smoking on the porch, and as the “scenery” looked nicer out there both men were content to wait outside. Rey left them to it and rejoined Rose. “What do you think they want?” Rose asked.</p>
<p>Rey thought back to the documentary she’d seen. This was the offer to join the protest at the Democratic National Convention, had to be. She hadn’t realized two of the future Chicago Seven had come in person to extend the invitation, this close to the event. Yet, the Ben she’d known in 2018 hadn’t made it there. She was determined to see that he did this time. It would be too important an event to miss.</p>
<p>She heard voices out on the porch. Ben was back and talking with him. She moved closer to the door to hear better. <em>Was that your old lady?</em> one of them asked. Rey shook her head, smiling. <em>More than that</em>, she thought.</p>
<p>The three men walked straight into the back, not seeing her, and closed Ben’s office door. The meeting took all of ten minutes, after which Hoffman and Rubin emerged without Ben and waved to all the ladies as they exited.</p>
<p>Rey slipped into Ben’s office and closed the door. He looked contemplative, perched on the edge of his desk twitching his forefingers. It had become a new quirk, without a cigarette to pinch between them. “What’s up?” she asked, knowing the answer.</p>
<p>“They want me in Chicago for the convention,” Ben said. He picked up a business card with a phone number scrawled in ink, no doubt given to him to finalize arrangements. “Big protest and march planned.”</p>
<p>Rey held her breath.</p>
<p>“I’m not going,” Ben said.</p>
<p>“What?” This was unexpected. “Why?”</p>
<p>Ben stood straight and wandered over to the bulletin boards. “For one, there’s too much to do here. I can’t let <em>The Rebellion</em> skip a few issues because I’m not here.”</p>
<p>“Other people work for this paper, Ben. Kay can typeset. You can dictate content over the phone… I’ll lay it out and get the dummy sheets to the printers.”</p>
<p>Ben turned to her. “If I go to Chicago, Rey, you’re coming with me,” he said. “I can’t believe you’d think I’d leave you here alone.”</p>
<p>The comment caught her off guard. Of course, it thrilled her to think Ben intended to bring her, but she heard more in his words. “You think I can’t handle operations on my own while you’re away?” she asked. “Why do you think those men came here? Word is obviously getting out, and not just <em>The Rebellion</em>. That speech…”</p>
<p>Ben reached for his back pocket and pulled out a cassette tape. “This speech,” he said. “Somebody taped it. They got a copy somehow. I didn’t even think to record it.”</p>
<p>Rey asked to see the tape. Oh, if only they’d had this at the gallery… “I’m so glad this exists,” she said, and looked up at him. “The more people who hear this, the bigger in demand you’ll be, Ben. You can’t turn down every offer. You want more exposure for <em>The Rebellion</em>, and this is how it begins.”</p>
<p>“And I can’t abandon the paper, not when we’re finally gaining traction.” Ben leaned against the wall, hitting his head against one of the boards. They’d reached an impasse, but maybe not. This was Ben’s wake up call to the fact that he couldn’t do everything alone.</p>
<p>“So don’t do it alone.” Rey pressed herself against him and took his face in her hands. “There’s a whole staff out there and they can do more than mail out newspapers. We’ll show them what to do. Give Rose more responsibility. She’s flourishing in sales, and she’s capable of more.”</p>
<p>“And who will manage Rose?” Ben huffed out a laugh.</p>
<p>“Armitage.”</p>
<p>“What?!”</p>
<p>The more Rey thought about it, the more it made sense. “He’s off days, and he already helps with the print runs,” she said. “He could use the extra money, too.” Maybe that would incentivize him to look into school.</p>
<p>She looked up at Ben. The gears were churning. He might not take all her suggestions, but she hoped she’d given him enough to finalize a plan for future absences. Then he asked, “What about you?”</p>
<p>“What about me? I can stay here, I can go with you.”</p>
<p>“Eisley’s isn’t going to let you take off whenever you feel like it,” he said.</p>
<p>“Then I’ll quit.” They could live cheaply until she found more flexible work.</p>
<p>Ben kissed her. “I hoped you would eventually, Chicago or not. I’m really getting tired of seeing other men touch you.”</p>
<p>He took her hand and led her out of his office into the main area and clapped his hands. “Listen up, everybody. I have an announcement.” All the staff gathered around and Rey listened with growing pride as Ben outlined a plan for The Rebellion that would allow him to travel and keep the paper running. Of course, everybody was on board and excited for the new opportunities. Even Rose, her run-in with Armitage notwithstanding, seemed willing to cooperate if the other man accepted.</p>
<p>All for the cause.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Wednesday, August 21, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Rey awoke to warm breath tickling her ear. She opened her eyes as Ben braced a hand on the mattress near her face and dropped a kiss on her cheek. She smiled and turned onto her back to receive him fully.</p>
<p>“Happy last day at your crummy job,” he said. “You excited?”</p>
<p>“Delirious.”</p>
<p>They lay together for countless seconds, Ben’s naked body lowered on hers, his hands groping her breasts and hips as their kisses increased in urgency. He moved down to capture her nipple between his teeth, worrying it lightly while brushing his tongue over the hardened tip. Rey shoved her fingers through his hair, luxuriating in the sensation.</p>
<p>Suddenly, he moaned and shook his head, pulling away with a loud smack. “No, no,” he said. “I have to get out of here.”</p>
<p>“Stay,” Rey said, her voice high and pleading. But Ben had already dragged the sheet halfway off the bed getting out. She didn’t bother to cover herself; she wanted Ben to see what he was missing.</p>
<p>Ben stood at his dresser, rummaging through the top drawer. “Believe me, I’d much rather be in bed with you than sitting in some office, kissing somebody’s ass. But there’s a lot of money at stake and we need it, especially since we’re leaving soon,” he said. He turned to face her, clutching the white wife beater and tie.</p>
<p>“Why can’t Rose handle it? She’s your salesperson. Come back to bed.”</p>
<p>“Rose is taking the dummy sheets to the printers today. Her first time by herself. She’s so proud to do it, I can’t take that away,” he said, and paused with his clothes. “I’m not even sure why this cat wants to see us. He owns a chain of car dealerships up the Peninsula to Richmond. What’s he want advertising in <em>The Rebellion</em>?”</p>
<p>Rey reclined on her side, hoping to present an alluring enough picture to take with him. “He sees potential,” she said. “<em>The Rebellion</em> has a diverse audience, and everybody needs a car eventually.” She also reminded him that J.B. Hutt’s business had picked up since his ads started running. People were noticing.</p>
<p>Ben put on the tank and affixed the tie in a loose knot. “He does sell Volkswagens. Might be time to trade in the Samba for a new model.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you dare,” she said, threatening him with a pillow. “We’re going to Chicago in that van. Everybody is going to see the Samba and know Ben Solo is there to change the world.”</p>
<p>“So is Rey Burke.” He grinned and, grabbing his good shirt and slacks on a wire hanger hanging from the curtain rod, disappeared into the bathroom. Rey listened to the <em>whoosh</em> of running water.</p>
<p>When he emerged fully dressed he grabbed his glasses and the socks he’d left on the dresser and came to sit by her.</p>
<p>“You have everything you need for the trip?” he asked. “I ask because it doesn’t seem like you have much.”</p>
<p>Rey reached out and stroked his arm. “I have everything I need. Besides, as hot as it gets at the beach, who needs lots of clothes? I’m sure August is as hot in Chicago.” Couple pairs of shorts and blouses and her jeans, and she was set.</p>
<p>“It will be hot, yes,” he said. “You don’t wear that nice green number anymore. You bringing that?”</p>
<p>“Jannah borrowed it a while back. Somehow it’s become part of her permanent wardrobe, but I got her Mary Janes, so I’d say it was fair trade.”</p>
<p>Ben got up and opened another drawer. He pulled out a wad of bills and counted a few out for her. “Go over to Rices Nachmans before work today, get at least one nice outfit. And another pair of shoes. It’s a big city and we’ll do a lot of walking.”</p>
<p>Rey whistled. From what she knew of local history Rices Nachmans was <em>fancy</em>. “You don’t think it will look odd, me in an upscale outfit chanting for our troops to come home?”</p>
<p>“It beats that bunny suit they make you wear at the club.” Ben kissed her. “Dress to impress, then reel them in. They won’t suspect a thing,” he said. “I love you.”</p>
<p>“I love you, too.”</p>
<p>“Wish me luck,” he said. Ben reached for his shoes and walked with them out of the bedroom, finger-combing his hair along the way. Rey remained in bed a while longer, basking in her contentment. She’d never seen a bluer sky than the one from Ben’s bedroom window. Their window. Tomorrow they’d leave the beach for a new adventure, and history. She was along for the ride until the very end.</p>
<p>When nature called, she rolled out of bed and freshened up for the day. Still naked, she padded over to the window and looked out to see the Samba still in its spot along the curb. Ben must have chosen the city bus this morning so as not to repulse Mr. Car Dealer, or else keep from tempting him into selling Ben something more practical.</p>
<p>So she’d take the Samba shopping. Maybe Rose would want to come along when she came back from the printers, make a day of it. Sell an ad to Rices Nachmans.</p>
<p>Rey found her appliqued jeans, her sleeveless yellow blouse and sandals, still eschewing the underthings as everybody else had done. The van’s keys were in the glove box, not Ben’s best habit, so Rey needed only her purse.</p>
<p>The purse was on Ben’s dresser, unlatched. She reached for the thin strap and it separated from the bag, causing everything to spill onto the floor. “Damn it.” Rey scooped up the fake driver’s license, Ben’s cigarettes, and the downstairs office keys when her gaze caught something shiny.</p>
<p>She picked up the coin and was about to toss it in when a tingling sensation struck her where the quarter touched. Rey inspected the profile of George Washington and tilted it in her palm, the date screaming back at her and bringing her blood to an awful chill.</p>
<p>
  <em>2018</em>
</p>
<p>“No,” she whispered. Where the hell had this come from? She’d cleaned out the purse before planning this trip, so she thought. The hat pin that was to have been her launch to the present was still affixed to the inner lining of her purse.</p>
<p>She’d sorted out change from her house to include with her bills. This 2018 quarter must have been swept in with the older coins and got stuck in the inner lining until now. How could she be so careless?</p>
<p>The first pain hit her in the abdomen, like the mother of all menstrual cramps. Rey clutched the coin in her fist, as though to hide it from sight and hopefully reverse the inevitable. She knew, however, it was too late. She’d launched the parachute, though accidentally, and she couldn’t stop the process.</p>
<p>“Ben.” Her voice came out in a strangled cry. Ben was gone, off to a sales meeting. He expected to see her back later today in a pretty new dress. Then they’d make love again, and talk about their trip.</p>
<p>It wasn’t going to happen.</p>
<p>
  <em>No. I’m going to Chicago. I’m staying here. It’s August twenty-first, nineteen sixty-eight.</em>
</p>
<p>The pain seared down her legs, and Rey collapsed to the floor. The air turned thick; she struggled to breathe. The light dimmed around her, or was she losing her eyesight?</p>
<p>
  <em>It’s August twenty-first, nineteen sixty-eight.</em>
</p>
<p>Every bone in her body shrieked with pain, then melted. An unseen force knocked the breath from her body, pinning her flat.</p>
<p>
  <em>It. Is. August. Twenty…</em>
</p>
<p>“BEN!” she cried out with her last ounce of strength, before the world turned black.</p>
<p>When she awoke, she was on the beach, yards away from Bazine Natel’s house. Rey lifted herself into a sitting position with a loud gasp, and caught sight of the ocean ahead of her.</p>
<p>She turned to her right. The new Marriott hotel stood tall and proud.</p>
<p>“No.” She stared at the monstrosity until her tears rendered it into a blur.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Thursday, July 5, 2018</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>She sat in place, purse on her lap, the sun beating down on her shoulders and hair, sobbing. It mattered nothing to her if passersby noticed; let them gawk and continue on down the sand, keeping her misery as a story to tell at the coffee shop or work. All she wanted was to go home. Not her apartment in 2018...Ben’s home in 1968. Ben’s bed. Their bed.</p>
<p>Rey took a deep breath, swallowing back her tears and wiping her pinched shut eyes. “Focus,” she told herself. She did it once. She willed her heartbeat to slow and breathed until the shuddering stopped.</p>
<p>“It is August twenty-first, nineteen sixty-eight,” she said in a low voice. Rey repeated the mantra in the same cadence as the first session. She brought her hands to touch her knees, folded in the same cross-legged position as before, and fought to slip into another meditative trance. The beach fought back, however. Too many noises from the street and shoreline. Some time had passed since she came here; hours, maybe. She wasn’t sure how much.</p>
<p>The distractions forced her to open her eyes, and she noticed she still wore the Mickey Mouse watch Ben had given her. The face was cracked and no arms moved. Useless, just like this second attempt.</p>
<p>“Wicket! Come here, boy.”</p>
<p>Rey jolted up to stand at the voice. She wobbled on unsteady legs. She turned toward the public access path to see Ben’s yellow Lab racing toward her. Ben strode her way at a slower pace, and from a distance. He’d dressed for a longer day at the beach, she guessed, in a pair of knee-length surf trunks and a tank underneath his blue shirt. He continued to call for his dog until he realized why Wicket had broken away from him.</p>
<p>“Rey?” he called out to her.</p>
<p>“Ben,” she whispered. He was seventy-eight again, but alive. She loved him.</p>
<p>To hell with decorum. She willed all strength to her legs and started a run. She was sluggish, wiped out from a fifty-year surge to the present. Wicket gamboled in circles around her, barking to play along. Ben moved forward to close the gap, his expression acknowledging her pain.</p>
<p>“Rey, are you all right? What’s wrong?” He held out his arms and she collapsed into them, crying out. Her body tingled all over like it had woken from a numbing sleep. Needles pricked under her skin, yet Ben’s touch relieved the pain in places.</p>
<p>“Here, sit down.” He lowered her back to the sand and sat with her, cursing when Wicket nosed in to sniff out the problem. “Wicket, go swim,” Ben ordered with a click of his tongue and the dog took off for the water. Rey saw it all from her peripheral vision, keeping her face pressed against his chest.</p>
<p>“It’s okay. Everything is okay. I got you,” he said, rocking her close, rubbing her back. It felt good. It felt like Ben, her Ben from fifty years ago. It felt like that night at the drive-in, and Rey closed her eyes and inhaled, hoping to smell fresh popcorn and tobacco instead of salt air and sand.</p>
<p>They were quiet a moment, then Ben said, “This shirt you have on looks familiar.”</p>
<p>“I wore it the day we met, in 1968.” Rey pulled away from his embrace far enough to look into his eyes. “Rose Tico brought me into <em>The Rebellion</em> offices, which were on the first floor of the house you rented. You assigned me to interview Wedge Antilles when none of your other reporters could get it done. You took me to the Shore Drive-In to see a double-feature with <em>Rosemary’s Baby</em>. We kissed there for the first time.”</p>
<p>“Rey…”</p>
<p>She held up a hand to silence him. “I red-inked one of your editorials, and Bazine thought you’d lose your shit but you didn’t,” he said. “We made love for the first time after having dinner at Wedge Antilles’s house. You drove us to Seashore State Park and we made s’mores --”</p>
<p>“Rey.” Ben took her hands in his and squeezed tight. They trembled; presumably he intended to calm her. “Everything you’re telling me, I wrote in that journal,” he said. “I was wrong to suggest you and I were ever involved, and I’m sorry. I’m just a confused old man chasing a ghost.”</p>
<p>Rey shook her head. “You’re not. You were right, Ben. I remember everything, and I didn’t read the entire journal. I destroyed it by accident, I’m sorry. But I was there, fifty years ago, with you. I lived it.” She wrested free of his grip and touched his face. “Ask me anything that wasn’t in the journal. I’ll prove it.”</p>
<p>Now Ben fought back tears. He tilted his face up to the sun, his dark eyes glassed over. “You’re asking me to go back fifty years and think of something I <em>didn’t</em> write down?”</p>
<p>Rey dropped her hands into her lap, then noticed it. She unbuckled the leather strap from her wrist and put the watch into Ben’s hands. “You gave me this,” she said.</p>
<p>Ben gaped at the unmoving Mickey Mouse, and the tears fell. “Oh, God. I haven’t seen this in...”</p>
<p>“Ask me anything,” she repeated, her voice hoarse.</p>
<p>Ben held her gaze again, his face shadowed and appearing older. “Why did you leave?” he demanded. “The van was still at home, and nobody had seen you all day. You vanished into thin air.”</p>
<p>Literally. “I didn’t want to, Ben. I couldn’t control it. I tried to stay, you have to believe me. I am so sorry.” The tears returned and Ben drew her close again to subdue them.</p>
<p>“It’s okay,” Ben said, more than once to soothe her. “All that matters is that you’re here, and I got you. I’m not letting you go again.”</p>
<p>“Ben…” Rey lifted her gaze and touched the corner of his eye, gathering the tears. She parted her lips to receive his in a gentle kiss that helped calm her. It didn’t take away all the pain, however.</p>
<p>Rey closed her eyes. Ben at seventy-eight kissed the same as Ben at twenty-eight. She only missed the scratch of his moustache and that scruff under his chin, nicking at her as they moved.</p>
<p>Ben tore free and hugged her tight, brushing against her ear. “Come back with me to the house,” he said. “Let me just hold you a while. It’s been too long.”</p>
<p>Rey needed that badly. To be able to lay down with Ben again, to have his arms around her in protection, would ease the pain. It wouldn’t erase her mistake, though, so she had to fix this.</p>
<p>Pulling away from him was difficult, but she forced herself to entangle herself from him and stand. “No, Ben,” she said.</p>
<p>“Rey, don’t. Don’t leave me again.” Ben reached up for her. It pained her to see his smile fall.</p>
<p>“I will come back to you, but in my own way. I did it before; I’ll do it again. Please let me do this.” She ducked down and kissed him, avoiding his grasp.</p>
<p>“I love you,” she said.</p>
<p>Clutching the bag to her chest, she ran for the access path back to her car, not heeding Ben as he shouted for her to turn around.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0025"><h2>25. Chapter 25</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes: super angst, some good news, and you might not like Amilyn (maybe even Rey) for a short time.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It amazed Rey how her time in 1968 changed her perspective on nearly everything. Traffic, heavier now than before, infuriated her. Every car in the city seemed to be in her way, and whenever she needed to brake she caught herself tapping her left foot on the floor, looking for a clutch that didn’t exist.</p>
<p>Her radio blasted out an auto-tuned singer she normally liked. Rey shut it off, disgusted.</p>
<p>When she finally arrived at the antique mall, she bolted a path to the back and barged into Amilyn’s bookstore. She scanned the narrow aisles for signs of life, then turned to where the woman held her tarot readings. Nobody there.</p>
<p>Rey called out the woman’s name. “Help me!” she cried, pacing past shelves. Amilyn stepped out from a hidden doorway and regarded her with surprise.</p>
<p>“Hey, you,” she said. “What brings you --”</p>
<p>Rey lunged forward and grabbed at Amilyn’s shawl. The force of her movement caused the woman to shuffle back a few steps. “Help me get back there,” she begged, her voice cracking. Amilyn blurred in her teary vision, but she didn’t mistake the confusion. She wasn’t being clear enough; she had to make sense.</p>
<p>“It worked.” She lowered her voice to a whisper.</p>
<p>“It worked,” echoed Amilyn, sounding uncertain.</p>
<p>“I read the book you gave me. I performed the meditation. It worked. I went back in time.” Rey spoke each word slowly, like addressing a child. “When I came back, I tried again and nothing happened. Amilyn...”</p>
<p>She was a woman possessed now, focused on Ben and desperate for help. It bothered her that Amilyn, who’d given her the damn book, looked at her like she was insane.</p>
<p>Rey reached up to pin Amilyn’s face between her hands. Amilyn grasped them and tried to bring them down. “Rey, you need to breathe,” she said.</p>
<p>“I need to get back to 1968. Now.”</p>
<p>Amilyn held her hands, pressing them together under her chin. Her gaze darted around the shelves closing in on them, presumably looking for spies. The woman shook her head. “Not here,” she said. “We need space, and you need air. Come on.”</p>
<p>Amilyn felt around in her skirt pocket, and Rey heard keys jangling. She let the woman guide her out of the bookstore area and toward the front registers. She waited as Amilyn asked one of the ladies to send a clerk to her store to watch over things. “It’s an emergency,” she said. “If I’m not back in an hour you can lock up my section.”</p>
<p>Rey then sat shotgun in Amilyn’s hybrid, riding toward the Chesapeake Beach area. Both were quiet for most of the ride. Thoughts of Ben in 1968 weighed on Rey’s mind. She imagined his reaction on coming home to find her gone. Maybe he hadn’t thought much of it initially, knowing he’d sent her off to shop and she’d come home excited with a bag of frocks to show off. He may have wondered why she didn’t take the van, then figured she preferred the bus or chose to hitch a ride with a friend.</p>
<p>As day darkened into evening, he’d worry. No phone calls, no word from friends that they’d seen her. Perhaps he’d gone out in the van to look for her, asked around about her at Rices Nachmans. Gone to Eisley’s to discover she never showed for her last shift. And, after coming home empty-handed, maybe he sat on the porch chain smoking, despite promising her he’d quit, watching the sidewalks for her. Wondering what happened.</p>
<p>Rey began to cry again when the car stopped in a driveaway. She looked up at a townhome duplex with a large wind chime hanging near the door and a chonky white cat sleeping on the top step.</p>
<p>Amilyn killed the engine and turned in her seat to face Rey. “Rey, whatever you have to say about your experience, I’ll believe you,” she said. “Okay? But it’s important you calm down and we go over everything together.” She pointed to her apartment. “I may be able to help, but I’ll warn you…”</p>
<p>Rey widened her eyes, looking at her.</p>
<p>“...I can’t promise you anything.”</p>
<p>Rey nodded. “Please, just hear me out.”</p>
<p>“That I can do.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Amilyn served her hot tea, and Rey drank it so as not to appear rude. Nonetheless, she found that having something warm in her hands helped. She could center on the dainty china cup and stare into the dark liquid, and allow Amilyn to guide her in a smooth, comforting voice.</p>
<p>She told her story, from her initial sit down at the beach in the early hours of July 5th -- today, though it didn’t seem right for her -- through the morning of August 21st, 1968 and that awful moment she found the 2018 minted quarter.</p>
<p>“I had a parachute, but it was a badge pinned inside my purse. I never touched it,” Rey said. “The coin must have gotten in with older change. It felt like a huge fist knocked me in the gut when I shot back here.” She took a deep breath. “Why did I come back to the day I left?” she asked. “Shouldn’t I have returned to August 21st of this year?”</p>
<p>Amilyn shook her head. “It’s all the book, Rey,” she said. “Coming back is like a slingshot reaction. You’re pulled back to the day of departure, so it’s only like a few hours passed. Same thing happened to me. It’s also kind of why I never attempted another trip. The pain of coming home saps you.”</p>
<p>“This isn’t my home anymore.” Rey shook her head. “Don’t tell me this is the universe’s way of righting a wrong. If anything, the universe is wrong to send me back.”</p>
<p>Amilyn placed a hand on Rey’s arm. “Rey, like I said, I believe every word of this. Now, I need for you to sit quietly and listen to me.” She waited a beat, then, “It’s clear you want to go back, and you know that Mr. Calrissian’s book says it’s possible to make multiple trips. However…”</p>
<p>Rey hated the pause for dramatic effect, but realized Amilyn was likely thinking of how to express her thoughts.</p>
<p>“You can’t do it today. Not necessarily because you’re wigged out,” she said. “You left in the early hours of July fifth, and woke up on the same day in 1968 in the morning. If you attempt to go back today, one of two things will happen.” Another pause, this time queuing Rey to think.</p>
<p>It came to her. “I’ll wake up there on July fifth again,” Rey said. “I’ll have reset everything.”</p>
<p>“Exactly. All you went through to forge a relationship with Ben Solo, you’d have to start over again. There’s no telling that it will go as smoothly as it did last time, either,” Amilyn said and released her touch. “But there’s another issue. Rey Burke woke up on the morning of July fifth in 1968. If you go back and wake up on the <em>evening</em> of July fifth, you may create some kind of glitch.”</p>
<p>What?</p>
<p>“Don’t you get it?” Amilyn asked on seeing her quiet reaction. “There could be two Rey Burkes existing on the same time plane. Your previous self would still be there tooling around, and not disappear until August twenty-first. What are you going to do for two months, hide? What if you run into yourself?”</p>
<p>Rey hadn’t considered that. “Okay, so then I have to travel back on August twenty-second.” <em>I can’t wait that long!</em> The museum’s exhibit would be in full swing by then. She’d see young Ben in photos and film everywhere she turned. Add to that the probability of present-day Ben constantly reaching out to her. “I’ll be driven mad.”</p>
<p>Amilyn shook her head. “Rey, there are other issues to consider.”</p>
<p>“What’s the problem? I go back the day after I ‘disappeared,’ and for Ben it’s a twenty-four hour absence at best,” Rey said. “I’ll think of an excuse.”</p>
<p>“Rey, you need to think of the impact you made in the two months you were there, not to mention the repercussions if you go back.” Amilyn rose from the table and returned with her laptop. She called up her browser and searched for Bazine Netal. The first result landed them on the woman’s biography on a local healthcare site.</p>
<p>“I told you Ben came into my store with his granddaughter. She’s also come in with her mother. I know Baz, Junior,” Amilyn said and showed Rey the webpage. “She’s an E.R. nurse, and she’s saved a few lives in her day. If you go back at a certain time, you could erase this woman from existence, and her daughter, too. The impact Baz has made on various lives now will change and maybe not for the better.”</p>
<p>“I want to be with Ben. I don’t care,” Rey said.</p>
<p>Amilyn stared hard at her. “You don’t care? Say that again, Rey. You erase Leia Netal, you erase her potential descendants. One of them might cure a disease or something in the future,” she said. “You already created a risk going back the first time, and by existing in the past you’ve come back to an altered timeline. Who knows what you did back then --”</p>
<p>“I have,” Rey cut in. <em>Of course!</em> She waved at Amilyn to perform a new search. “Search for Rose Tico.”</p>
<p>Amilyn did as told. The first result led them to a Facebook page for one Rose Tico-Hux. <em>Hux!</em> Rey let out a cry.</p>
<p>“See that?” she tapped at the screen. “Before I left, Rose Tico had never married. She used to fight with this man all the time. She married him,” she said. “Go to the museum’s Instagram page. I want to see something.”</p>
<p>A grid of <em>Time Has Come Today</em> preview photos appeared. The middle entry on the top row was a carousel, the first picture showing the Sixties shot of Rose and Armitage arguing at the protest. Amilyn clicked through to read the description.</p>
<p>
  <em>Once they stood on different sides of the issues, but Rose Tico and Armitage Hux eventually reached across the aisle and learned it’s better to make love, not war. Then they walked down the aisle! Experience their story at The Naboo Gallery this August.</em>
</p>
<p>The second photo was of their wedding, and the third revealed the present-day couple standing next to their Sixties fight picture, kissing.</p>
<p>“He’s alive!” Tears stung Rey’s eyes. “Ben told me Hux had died years ago. Whatever illness he had, Rose must have helped him stay healthy. Amilyn, my being there did this!” she cried. “Don’t you think this was worth the risk?”</p>
<p>Amilyn watched Rey’s reaction, looking close to tears herself. “I really wish I could remember the timeline before you changed it, the way you do,” she said. “Still…”</p>
<p>“This is what I want, with Ben.”</p>
<p>“I know you do, honey,” Amilyn said. “I don’t want to be a killjoy and say you can’t have it. But I can’t not play devil’s advocate here. When I traveled back, I didn’t forge a serious romance. I basically got an eyeful of Regency London and got out when the heat turned up, if you know what I mean.</p>
<p>“The way I see it,” she continued, “you have two choices.” Amilyn ticked them off her fingers. “One: you drive to Ben Solo’s house right now, tell him you love him, and make the most of a May-December romance. Baz will probably lose her shit that her dad’s in love with a woman less than half his age, but it’s his life.”</p>
<p>Rey took a deep breath. “That’s my Plan B,” she said. “I’d gladly do that if I didn’t believe I could return. But that gives me, what? Ten years at best if he stays healthy? I want fifty years, Amilyn. I want to grow old alongside the man.” She gestured to the Huxes. “I want that.”</p>
<p>Amilyn clicked inside the search bar and called up Ben’s Wikipedia page. “Then this is your Plan A, at least it’s what I recommend,” she said. She scrolled to the Personal Life section and read a few sentences of it aloud: “Ben Solo was married once, to peace activist Bazine Netal. Their only child, Bazine Netal, Jr., was born September 14, 1970. Ben and Bazine, Sr. were married on September 28, 1970 and divorced in 1979. Bazine, Sr. died of breast cancer in 1993.”</p>
<p>Amilyn leaned back. “I wonder why Baz never took her father’s name. She never married, which is why Leia has her name.”</p>
<p>“It was the Sixties, I guess.” Rey stared at the words. “That would put Baz, Senior’s pregnancy between January and September of that year. Feasibly I can perform the meditation tomorrow, going to nineteen seventy, and she’d be about seven months along. Plus Ben wouldn’t be married to her…” She thought a moment. Ben’s daughter would live, but what about his reaction? To her it would be a day’s passing, to him two years.</p>
<p>She replayed various scenarios in her mind. Ben rushing to her with relief, joy, anger, fury. Ben relieved to find her alive and well, Ben coldly dismissing her, Ben accusing her of abandoning him. Ben asking her to marry him, Ben telling her to get lost, Ben telling her he moved on and has a family.</p>
<p>“What’s it gonna be?” Amilyn asked.</p>
<p>Rey put her hands together, rocking in her seat. “The day I first met Ben, in this time, we sat in his van and he told me he knew me from before. He said he never loved his wife, but we were interrupted before he could explain why,” she said, and looked at Amilyn. “If I call him now to ask why he’s going to think I’ve lost my mind.”</p>
<p>She inhaled and let it out slowly. “I saw it firsthand in nineteen sixty-eight. I want to take the chance that my disappearance didn’t change his heart.” Clearly it hadn’t, given old Ben’s reaction to her this morning. “I’m going back tomorrow.”</p>
<p>Amilyn took her hand again. “I’m going with you.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0026"><h2>26. Chapter 26</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes: discussion of family secrets, abortion, pregnancy, infidelity, the Mansons</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Mr. Calrissian, in his book, wrote on the theory of tandem time travel, but stressed it was not an experiment he attempted himself. For two people to travel to the same point in the past, he suggested a shared meditation performed with constant physical contact. Amilyn's idea, once they decided upon a meditative script, was to sit side by side with arms linked.</p>
<p>They returned to the antique mall, where Amilyn purchased an outfit from the same cranky seamstress. Rey still had a collection of cash from the time period, but Amilyn told Rey keep the money and her fake ID in her pockets. “You have to be as unencumbered as possible,” she said. “I’ll carry the parachute, but it’s only for me to go back.”</p>
<p>Amilyn helped her prepare. They inspected every bill before Rey tucked them away, and Rey eschewed change altogether. She refused to repeat her blunder. Following a thorough inspection of her outfit in the office of Amilyn’s shop, the two women took Rey’s car out to the Oceanfront to scout a place for traveling.</p>
<p>“I don’t want to go back to the beach access spot where Ben lives now,” Rey said. For one, it was a long walk to Ben’s old house, and present-day Ben might see her tonight. “I have an idea.”</p>
<p>The house where Rose and Paige lived in 1968 remained intact. It now served as a seasonal rental owned by an agency, and at the moment it was vacant. The neighborhood was quiet, and any people out and about paid no mind to the two women looking inside the windows of the empty beach cottage.</p>
<p>“Were these trees here fifty years ago? Do you remember?” Amilyn gestured to the trio of pines bordering the fence on the right side of the house.</p>
<p>“I believe so.”</p>
<p>Amilyn walked closer and checked the street from the new vantage point. “When it gets dark, let’s come back and sit here. There should be enough cover to hide us in case of late night dog walkers or something.”</p>
<p>They set the plan. As they walked back to the car Amilyn took Rey’s hand, which was trembling. “Let’s get something to eat,” her friend said. “Get our bearings, be calm.”</p>
<p>“Right,” Rey said. Her heart beat fast enough to power an entire city.</p>
<p>“Rey.”</p>
<p>She looked into Amilyn’s eyes.</p>
<p>“This will work. You’re going home.”</p>
<p>“I’m going home.” Rey spoke it out loud to manifest it. She suggested getting takeout and checking in at her apartment. “I think I’d be in a better frame of mind if I stayed in a familiar place for a while.”</p>
<p>Amilyn agreed and they picked up Chinese. Rolling into her complex’s parking lot, Rey stopped short before turning into her space. She saw the figure in white before Amilyn did.</p>
<p>Ben Solo was sitting on the steps near her door, waiting for her.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>He’d changed clothes from earlier. The Nirvana shirt from the museum, unbuttoned blue shirt over that, white pants, Vans with no socks. He held a cane, which he used to lift himself from the steps to greet both women.</p>
<p>“I asked you not to leave me again, Rey.” His voice was gentle but Rey didn’t miss the cool undertone. It hurt Rey to hear it; leaving him was the last thing she wanted, but how to explain that she intended to correct her mistake?</p>
<p>“I went to the museum first. You didn’t show up for work, you didn’t answer your phone. They don’t know where you are,” he said, and Rey felt mortified. Her phone was inside; she’d have to ingratiate herself to Mon and beg forgiveness.</p>
<p>“Good thing there’s only one Rey Burke in the city. I didn’t have to go far to track you here.” Ben then addressed Amilyn before Rey got in a word. “You’re the lady who gives tarot readings at the antique mall.”</p>
<p>“I am, Mr. Solo.” She nodded. “I gave you one once, as I recall.”</p>
<p>“You said I would find something I lost.” His attention returned to Rey. Her heart thrummed. “Didn’t think you meant the love of my life.”</p>
<p>“Ben, can we go inside?” Rey got out her key. “We have enough food here for all of us --”</p>
<p>“I want you to come home with me, Rey.” Yet he moved aside to let her pass. “Unless you prefer I move in here. I’ll pack a bag and hope your complex takes dogs.”</p>
<p>Rey whirled around, pushing open her front door. “Do you want to know why I left, in 1968?” she asked. She looked past Ben for a moment at the panic in Amilyn’s expression. Rey figured the truth couldn’t make this situation any stranger. “Come inside and I’ll tell you everything, and then I’ll tell you how we plan to fix it.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>She left a message for Mon, claiming a Fourth of July hangover that had knocked her on her ass. She had plenty of sick leave and hoped Mon would let the slip pass, considering her otherwise spotless work record.</p>
<p>Rey then told Ben everything. How Amilyn gave her Mr. Calrissian’s book. Her time travel back to 1968. Finding the 2018 quarter in her purse after he left for that advertising meeting. The plan to travel back to 1970 so as not to erase Bazine, Jr. and her daughter.</p>
<p>All through her soliloquy, Ben sat silently at her kitchen table, an untouched plate of sesame chicken before him. He steepled his hands, fingertips pressed to his lips, his expression pensive. When Rey finished with a heavy sigh, he let his hands drop to his lap.</p>
<p>“You think we’re looney,” Rey said.</p>
<p>He bowed his head and said, “I don’t think you’re looney. I’m an old beatnik turned hippie. I’ve heard and seen far weirder shit.”</p>
<p>Ben looked up into her eyes. “You need to wait, Rey. Go back to August twenty-second in 1968, the day after you disappeared.”</p>
<p>Rey looked at Amilyn, mouth agape for a second before she recovered. “Ben, if I do that we’ll erase your daughter --”</p>
<p>“Baz is not my biological daughter, Rey.”</p>
<p><em>What?</em> The news came as a shock to her system. Nothing in her research for the exhibit indicated that Bazine Netal, Jr. was anybody but Ben Solo’s daughter.</p>
<p>“It’s not common knowledge,” Ben said. “I never slept with Baz’s mother, ever. We kept separate bedrooms throughout our marriage. I had affairs, she had affairs, and eventually we both wanted out. Long after you’d left, when it became clear you weren’t coming back, she did come on strong and I fought her off. Then she got pregnant and Poe took off…”</p>
<p><em>Whoa</em>. “Poe Dameron is Baz’s father?”</p>
<p>Ben shrugged. “Was, for all I know. He never came back, either. All the free love of the Sixties aside, an unmarried pregnant woman in the South was still a stigma,” he said. “Everybody nagged me to help her. Armitage had married Rose by then. My mother told me to let you go… and I didn’t want Baz getting a back alley abortion and risking her life. So we had a marriage of convenience and I raised Baz, Junior as my own.” He huffed. “My parents figured it was the only way they were getting a grandchild.”</p>
<p>“She doesn’t know the truth?” Amilyn asked.</p>
<p>“Baz knows, but Leia doesn't. And neither do you.” Ben put a finger to his lips. “It’s shitty, yes, but I’ve let so much time pass, I don’t see the point in telling Leia now; Baz might tell her after I'm gone. I do love them both as though they were blood.” He stretched his free hand to Rey, who took it and squeezed tight.</p>
<p>“Rey, those first two years after you disappeared were sheer hell for me. We looked everywhere. My Uncle Luke had his cop friends searching… they even dragged the Elizabeth River. Rose told me this story about an abusive ex. We assumed he found you and took you.” Ben’s expression turned haunted. “It made more sense to me a year later when the Mansons…</p>
<p>“Anyway, the paper almost folded because I couldn’t work,” he continued. “If I didn’t have Armie and Rose picking up the slack I’d have been sunk.”</p>
<p>His voice cracked. “If you have to wait until August to try your time travel trick so only a day passes for me in 1968, do it. I’ve waited fifty years, Rey. Surely you can wait two months.”</p>
<p>Tears dried on Rey’s cheeks, and new ones replaced them. She caught the glint of Ben’s Marian medal, which had worked itself out from underneath his t-shirt. Those open arms reached out to her. She thanked all things divine that he had tracked her down and intercepted her before she and Amilyn attempted the trip to 1970. She’d have skipped two years for nothing.</p>
<p>She glanced at Amilyn. If going back in August didn’t impact Baz and Leia’s lives, she was fine with it. “I can wait two months,” she said.</p>
<p>“So can I,” Amilyn told her, and rose from her chair. “I’m calling a rideshare. I should leave you two alone for a bit. It’s been a hell of a day, and I need to recover as well.” She kissed both of them goodbye and promised to stay in touch until the appointed time.</p>
<p>Alone with Ben, Rey leaned forward and kissed him. “When do you have to be home?”</p>
<p>“I’m a grown-ass man, Rey.” He smiled at her. “Whenever I want.” On cue, his phone pealed and he brought it out to grimace at Baz’s name on the screen. “Not now, Baz.” To Rey, “Can I see this book you used?”</p>
<p>He left the phone on the table, and Rey took his hand and led him to the bedroom. The move was natural to her, and she was tempted to ask him to stay the night. She imagined he’d consent, and if all they did was cuddle it would suffice for now.</p>
<p>Ben perched on her bed and thumbed through <em>The Time Tourist</em>. “Rey,” he said, “do you know where this book came from?”</p>
<p>“Amilyn’s shop, I told you.”</p>
<p>He flipped to the back cover, to which the last blank page was stuck. Ben dislodged it to reveal small block handwriting. <em>B. Solo, 1965.</em></p>
<p>“Would you look at that?” he said, his grin wide.</p>
<p>“I don’t believe it.” Rey held the book now, turning it in her hands to jar a memory of seeing it in Ben’s old home.</p>
<p>“I forget where I got this book, probably a friend who knew I was into weird shit. I figured it was a goof, never thought this time travel might actually work. How did you miss seeing that in 1968, Rey?”</p>
<p>She shrugged. “I didn’t spend a lot of time browsing your shelves, Ben. I was more interested in other furniture...like your bed.”</p>
<p>He leaned close and brushed his lips against her ear. “I’m glad for that. I want you to go back so I can have you in that bed again.” He kissed her. “For the next fifty years.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0027"><h2>27. Chapter 27</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>content notes: unprotected sex, talk of pregnancy</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Tuesday, August 21, 2018</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Rey sat in her office, counting the minutes until the end of her work day. She was drinking from a can of Coca-Cola, doctored with a splash of rum from an airport bottle she’d smuggled in her purse. The soda tasted nothing like the pure sugar delight of its 1968 version, and she couldn’t wait to go back and indulge in a bottle or two.</p>
<p>Sipping quietly, she congratulated herself on surviving the last forty-seven days. It helped, after all, to have regular contact with Amilyn and Ben, the latter bringing Wicket over often to her apartment for quasi-therapy dog duty. Promoting the exhibit helped the time pass as well. The opening reception, especially, had lifted her spirits because it allowed her to meet with Rose and Armitage as a happily married couple of many decades.</p>
<p>Rey thought back to opening night, how she approached the retired lawyer -- now in his mid-seventies, more silver-haired than red -- looking at the infamous argument photo. She pulled up the museum’s Instagram on her phone and showed him the high engagement on the before and after photos. “People are truly inspired,” she said, reading a comment about how theirs was now their favorite enemies-to-lovers story.</p>
<p>“We really weren’t enemies. We just bugged the hell out of each other,” Armie told her with a laugh, then turned serious. “Between you and me, though,” he glanced at Rose, chatting with a group on the other side of the room, “I’d always liked her. Somebody had to point it out to me.”</p>
<p>Like Rose of 2018, Armitage didn’t recognize her, either. Rey simply nodded and continued to listen to him talk about his life with Rose and their family.</p>
<p>Before and after the opening, she and Ben had gone out several times since her return to 2018, all the “nice shoes and shave first” dates he’d wanted fifty years ago. People gave them funny looks once in a while, as they held hands and walked with their arms about each other’s waists, but who cared?</p>
<p>For all the time spent together, though, they hadn’t made love. It damn near killed Rey, and despite telling Ben that the current age gap didn’t matter to her, he still held back. One night he offered a compromise. “If you fail with this trip,” he said, “on August twenty-third I’m moving in and you can ravage me all you want.”</p>
<p>“I won’t fail,” she said. She had to keep the manifestation alive.</p>
<p>Mon Mothma broke her reverie by coming into her office. “You look content.”</p>
<p>Rey smiled and finished her soda. “It was a good day. A busier Tuesday than usual.”</p>
<p>“Word of mouth is growing on the exhibit. I hope the next one is as successful,” said her boss. “It’s helping that Mr. Solo has been by often and talking with visitors. He may as well volunteer as a docent.”</p>
<p>It was true. He hadn’t come today, however. They agreed Rey should have some space to psyche herself properly for the trip. She checked her phone and opened it to his last text. <em>See you soon. I love you. &lt;3</em></p>
<p>Mon fished for her car keys and offered to walk Rey out. “Tomorrow will be even better. I feel it.”</p>
<p>“It will.” Rey had no plans to come into work tomorrow.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Wednesday, August 22, 2018</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Shortly after one in the morning, Rey and Amilyn sat cross-legged on the front lawn of the vacant house in their Sixties garb. Their bare forearms linked, their knees touched, and each bowed her head and breathed in unison.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is August twenty-second, nineteen sixty-eight. We are sitting in front of Rose Tico’s house. Ben Solo lives two blocks away.</em>
</p>
<p>Rey found comfort in the connection she made with Amilyn as they meditated together. The touch helped to ground her and keep her mind from wandering and worrying. Behind her eyes she called up an image of young Ben and recalled everything about him. His smell, the roughness of his skin on hers, his hardness inside her.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is August twenty-second, nineteen sixty-eight. We are sitting in front of Rose Tico’s house. Ben Solo lives two blocks away.</em>
</p>
<p>The vibrations within her began; she felt Amilyn rippling beside her. Rey rode the wave backward through time. It was working.</p>
<p>
  <em>It is August twenty-second, nineteen sixty-eight. We are sitting in front of Rose Tico’s house. Ben Solo lives two blocks away…</em>
</p>
<p>The meditation ran in an endless loop in Rey’s mind until it didn’t, and Amilyn’s voice broke through.</p>
<p>“Rey...we’re here.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Thursday, August 22, 1968</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The lawn was higher, weedier, just as she remembered. They still sat, backed against the trees. Rey looked up and saw Armitage’s truck in the driveway.</p>
<p>Their arms were still linked. Rey pulled away with caution and, when breaking contact delivered no adverse effects, she leaned over and hugged Amilyn.</p>
<p>“We did it!”</p>
<p>“What time is it?” Amilyn tucked her legs in to stand and helped Rey upright. It was bright out, hot. Cars rolled slowly up the road and young children were dashing out of their homes to play.</p>
<p>“It still looks early.” Rey looked for the sun to gauge time of day. It wasn’t too high up in the sky. “I don’t know what to do first, knock on the door or go straight to Ben’s.” Her stomach roiled at the thought of doing either. To everybody here she hadn’t been away long, but she still worried about how people might react to her mysterious reappearance.</p>
<p>“I think the first thing you should do is take a deep breath, Rey. Your friends will be relieved to know you are okay.” Amilyn clasped Rey’s hand in hers and squeezed. “You know, we didn’t come up with a backstory for me. Do you want to tell them I’m a friend, or cousin…”</p>
<p>“A friend, somebody who helped me,” Rey agreed, smiling. “That’s what you are. Rose is my friend, too.” She looked at the house just as the front door opened. Armitage emerged into the day wearing a t-shirt and shorts. Behind him, Rose pushed out in her beaded halter and a skirt, and thin sandals.</p>
<p>“I still think we should try the bus station,” Armitage was saying. “Pass her picture around. Ask if they saw her.”</p>
<p>“She wouldn’t get on a bus without saying goodbye. And why would she leave?” Rose asked. “We have to go to the cops.”</p>
<p>“Are you hearing the words coming out of your mouth? You want to talk to cops.”</p>
<p>“Ben’s uncle, at least. He’s not as bad --”</p>
<p>Rey was watching the exchange and let out a laugh on seeing her old friends banter more like lovers than enemies. It caused Rose to look in her direction, and the woman paled. She screeched, which caused Armitage to look up.</p>
<p>Rose then let out a loud, “REY!” and ran toward her. Before Rey realized it she was caught up in a tight hug.</p>
<p>“Thank God! We all thought something bad happened. Rey, I am so happy to see you.” Rose rocked her roughly in her embrace, and Rey fought for a breath. Amilyn had stepped out of the line of fire, ignored by Rose as she continued to babble.</p>
<p>“What happened? Ben said you went out to buy clothes and you didn’t come home. You didn’t show up for your job, either. We looked for you everywhere. I was thinking maybe that ex of yours found you and took you.” Rose pulled back, crying. She sniffed loudly and clung to Rey’s arms as though confirming she was real. “You scared the shit out of me, and Ben…”</p>
<p>At this, Rose reared back and gasped. “Ben,” she said. “Does he know you’re back?”</p>
<p>“No. I came here first. I wanted to see --”</p>
<p>Rose was trembling, and it worried Rey. What was going through her friend’s mind? She spoke up but Rose talked over her.</p>
<p>“Oh, hell. I hope it’s not too late.” Rose backed away a few steps, then turned and ran across the lawn, then the street without looking, in the direction of Ben’s house. She screamed Ben’s name along the way.</p>
<p>Rey felt close to a full panic attack. She clutched her chest; Amilyn held her back. “Rey, it won’t do you good to pass out,” she said, and beckoned Armitage closer. He came and drew Rey into a gentler hug.</p>
<p>“Hey, you,” he said. “You had so many people worried.”</p>
<p>“I wish I could explain it,” Rey said, and looked to Amilyn for guidance. The other woman stepped forward and shook Armitage’s hand.</p>
<p>“I found her early this morning, disoriented and walking along the boulevard,” Amilyn said. “She was dehydrated, so I got her some water and juice at breakfast and it helped her memory. She said she lives here.”</p>
<p>“She does, rather she did once.” Armitage gave Rey an odd look. “Thank you for taking care of her. Rey, we should go see Ben now.” He guided her in a slow walk toward the street.</p>
<p>“Did you hit your head?” he asked Rey. “You forgot you had moved in Ben.”</p>
<p>“I didn’t really, Armitage. It’s just --”</p>
<p>“Maybe you should go to the hospital. I can call Ben from there.” Armitage then pulled her toward his truck.</p>
<p>“I’m fine,” she insisted. Not really. Not even twenty-four hours had passed for the people of 1968, but Rey let two months pass since that blasted coin shot her back to 2018. She was done waiting.</p>
<p>Rey broke free of Armitage’s grip and ran.</p>
<p>“Rey!” he called from behind her.</p>
<p>She threw one of her sandals running but didn’t stop. The gravel and loose asphalt cut into her bare foot but she didn’t care. She kept on until she reached Ben’s street, stopping just a few houses short of his on the sidewalk.</p>
<p>The microbus was parked in front of the house, facing away. Ben stood next to it, still shaggy and handsome. Dungarees and rolled up sleeves, ink stains and that under-chin scruff she loved. Rose had his waist in a death grip; she gasped for air and struggled with her words. “Will you calm down?” he said. “You acting all hysterical isn’t helping us find --”</p>
<p>His attention flicked in Rey’s direction for one second, then he paused and turned slowly to her. Rose noticed the change in his posture as well and dropped back.</p>
<p>Rey took a few steps closer, unsure of what to say to alleviate the tension from this moment. She only wanted Ben to know she was so very sorry for worrying him. With every step she made he repeated, and they moved closer until they were standing inches apart.</p>
<p>He looked down at her with liquid eyes and he twitched his lip, as though deciding whether or to smile or cry. When he lifted his hands to cup either side of her face and she felt his warmth, she knew.</p>
<p>“Rey the stray,” he whispered. “Thank God.” He crushed his lips to hers, guiding them to open and take the kiss deeper. Rey clamped her arms around him, vowing to never let go. She felt his hands leave her face and drop down her back to cup her bottom, and in seconds she was lighter than air.</p>
<p>Ben was lifting her. Rey brought her legs around him and hooked them at the ankles. She kept kissing him, brushing her lips against his cheek, his nose along his moustache as he turned and walked them toward the van.</p>
<p>“Ben, I am so sorry,” she said. “It was out of my control. I --”</p>
<p>Ben shushed her. “Tell me later,” he said. Rey craned her neck to see that Armitage and Amilyn had caught up to them and were watching the reunion with obvious joy.</p>
<p>He carried her to the front passenger door, opened it, and deposited her in the seat. “Is your bag upstairs packed?”</p>
<p>“Uh, yeah. Where are we going?”</p>
<p>“Chicago. Did you forget already?” He gave her a look of disbelief. He shut the door, then asked Armitage to come into the house to help with luggage.</p>
<p>Amilyn came up to Rey’s door. She stuck her hand through the open window for an awkward hug. “You got this,” she whispered in Rey’s ear. “I’ll see you in fifty years.”</p>
<p>“I hope when you get back, I’m an old hippie lady.”</p>
<p>“Count on it.” With that, Amilyn started back down the street.</p>
<p>Rose then came up and kissed her. “Rey, I have to tell you something.” A shadow suddenly crossed Rose’s face and it worried Rey. “When you didn’t come home last night, Armitage came over to help look. We drove around Norfolk in his truck. I really thought you had been kidnapped.”</p>
<p>“Rose, it was an accident, what happened.” Rey reached down and squeezed her friend’s hand. “I never meant to scare anybody.”</p>
<p>Rose sniffled and looked away. “Armitage took me home. I was crying and upset, and he was being nice to me...” She looked into Rey’s eyes. “We did it last night.”</p>
<p>“You had sex,” Rey said. Knowing the end result in 2018, this thrilled Rey, but poor Rose looked as though she’d mightily sinned.</p>
<p>“And it was really good,” Rose said.</p>
<p>“Then why are you crying?”</p>
<p>“Rey,” Rose wailed, “I slept with a Republican. He campaigned for <em>Nixon</em>!”</p>
<p><em>For the love of…</em> “Rose, it’s not November yet. He can change parties and he doesn’t have to <em>vote</em> for Nixon!”</p>
<p>The men emerged from the house and loaded luggage into the van. Ben didn’t say another word until coming up to the driver’s side door. Calmly, he peeled a key off its ring and handed it to Armitage, giving him a hug. “You two know where to call if you need help,” he said. He then kissed Rose goodbye. “Paper’s yours until we get back, please don’t kill Armitage,” he said, and got behind the wheel.</p>
<p>Ben started the engine and pulled away. They were off, finally, on that grand adventure. Rey brought up one knee and braced her bare heel on the edge of her seat. “Are we really driving to Chicago, right now?”</p>
<p>Ben nodded and glanced at her, dead serious. “We’ll get there eventually, but we may not make it for the convention. I’ve decided we’re taking a detour to Vegas.”</p>
<p>“Vegas?” Hell of a detour. “Why?”</p>
<p>“We’re getting married.”</p>
<p>The breath left her body. Soon as she caught it, she asked, “Are you sure?”</p>
<p>“I’m not letting you out of my sight ever again, Rey,” he said. “I didn’t sleep. I didn’t know what to think, except that just when I thought I found the love of my life, she might not come back.”</p>
<p>Rey started crying. This Ben wouldn’t believe the truth. She buried her face in her hands, calming down when Ben’s hand rubbed her shoulder.</p>
<p>“Rose told me you had an abusive ex. I wish you’d said something,” he said. “She thought he found you and kidnapped you. I have to tell you,” he let out a heavy breath, “you know what, it’s over. I just want to be happy you’re safe and I want you to marry me.”</p>
<p>“Ben, that’s the only thing I want.” She laughed, tears coming full force now. “It’s just…”</p>
<p>The van slowed.</p>
<p>“I’m missing a shoe.”</p>
<p>Ben sagged. “Rey, I’ll buy you new shoes.” He sped up the van.</p>
<p>“I never did buy that fancy dress,” Rey said, and reached into her jeans pocket. She had the money Ben had given her. No more coins from the future. No more parachutes. “I guess we can shop in Chicago. Or Vegas. Wherever.”</p>
<p>“How about we stop now?”</p>
<p>“What?”</p>
<p>Ben pulled off the side of the road and killed the engine. “Get in the back. We’re going to make love now.”</p>
<p>“Here?” They’d parked alongside a major highway. <em>Why am I questioning this?</em> she thought.</p>
<p>Ben was already unbuttoning his shirt. “Get that beautiful bod of yours and your one shoe on that mattress this very minute. Go!”</p>
<p>The mattress had been made up nicely in anticipation of the Chicago trip. It had a new fitted sheet and soft blankets, and thick pillows lined the edge of the back seat. The idea had been to camp in the van wherever they ended up in the city. Memories of their first time here flooded her mind and heart.</p>
<p>Rey sank back and worked off her jeans while Ben removed every stitch on him. He helped get off her shirt -- no underthings, Rey was happy to live unencumbered for the rest of her life -- and sat back a moment to appreciate her.</p>
<p>“I was starting to think I’d never get to make love to you again,” he said. “We got a long drive ahead of us, longer if I have to stop every hour.” He started the trail of kisses along her jawline, lowering to her neck and further south.</p>
<p>“How about we stop at every state border?” she said, squirming under his touch. “I’ve always wanted to have sex in every state.”</p>
<p>“One down, forty-nine to go.” Ben buried his face between her thighs and licked her to a quick yet explosive orgasm. Rey didn’t have time to react before Ben sprang forward and pushed into her.</p>
<p>He apologized for going too fast, too hard. “I promise, when we stop to camp I’ll go all night with you,” he said.</p>
<p>“Ben.” Rey was panting now. The sun beat through the windows as they rocked the van. It was blessed hot and they were sticky and sweating, and she didn’t give a damn. “Stay inside me this time when you come, please?”</p>
<p>Ben lifted his upper body as he fucked her. His Marian medal hung low from his neck, scraping her skin. “Are you sure?”</p>
<p>“I know the cause is important, but I want to go to Vegas. I want to be your wife. I want your babies.” Rey held his face. “If it doesn’t happen now, I want to try every day until it does.”</p>
<p>“Rey…”</p>
<p>He collapsed, rocking harder into her. Rey felt his heart pounding, his breath hitching in her ear. She closed her eyes to take in every sensation, crying out when he came, when he didn’t pull out.</p>
<p>Crying, happily, when he held her afterward.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rose stood with Armitage, watching as the Solo Samba chugged up the street and turned a corner, disappearing from sight. It was a quiet moment enhanced by Armitage brushing his face in Rose’s hair, then broken when he admonished her.</p>
<p>“You scared the hell out of me, taking off like that,” he said. “What if you fell?”</p>
<p>“I wasn’t going to let Ben drive off before Rey could see him.”</p>
<p>“Drive where? He wasn’t going to Chicago without her.” He held her tighter to him for a second, then took her hand and kissed it. She didn’t resist.</p>
<p>“Are you sorry about what we did?” he asked, turning her so their gazes met.</p>
<p>The memory of holding Armitage close, laying naked together, flashed in Rose’s mind. “No,” she said. “I’m sorry you had to miss work, though. I know you need the money.”</p>
<p>“Well, I was due for a sick day, and if they fire me I’ll find something else.” Armitage smiled down at her and cupped her cheek. “But I’m free until my next shift, and I’d like to spend more time with you.”</p>
<p>The roommates would be getting up about now, preparing for their respective work days. The other office girls would be along soon to helm <em>The Rebellion</em> in Ben’s absence. “Well, nobody’s here yet,” she said, “and Ben’s room’s free.”</p>
<p>“Surely you’re not suggesting --”</p>
<p>Rose leaned in and, raising herself on the balls of her feet, kissed Armitage. Then they started up the stairs into Ben’s house.</p>
<p>“We ought to talk to that lady Rey was with first,” said Armitage. “I fear Rey might have been injured last night. Maybe she could fill us in on the last few hours.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.” The woman with the light purple hair. Rose looked around and saw no such person. “Where’d she go?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0028"><h2>28. Chapter 28</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>If you've come this far, I thank you for joining me on this wild ride. Special thanks, once again, to "Elopez7228" for the prompt.</p>
<p>content notes: mention of illness, no death</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You were planning to drive the Samba to Chicago.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN: Yes.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You never made it, however. Some would say you dodged a bullet by missing the arrest and subsequent trial.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN (shaking his head): I don’t know, did I?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: You don’t believe your no-show hurt your standing in the community?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN: There were more important things happening in my life at the time.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>INTERVIEWER: Like what?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>BEN (glancing to his right, at REY, and smiling): Maybe you should ask my wife what we did instead.</em>
</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>
  <strong>
    <em>Wednesday, August 22, 2018</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>A broad, wet tongue licked her awake, but there was nothing sensual about it.</p>
<p>Rey Solo moaned, her eyes still closed, and brought a hand to her face to dissuade her tormentor. “Wicket, stop,” she said. “Mommy’s up now. Go bother Daddy.”</p>
<p>As she sat up in bed, the yellow Lab dashed around the bed and gave Ben similar treatment. Her husband proved more reluctant to wake, rolling over to drape an arm across Rey’s lap.</p>
<p>“Wicket,” he said, his voice muffled in the mattress, “go walk yourself.”</p>
<p>Rey leaned down to kiss Ben. “I will walk him. You sleep in.”</p>
<p>“No.” Ben opened his eyes, and pulled himself up for a deeper kiss. “Rosie can do it. It’s why we had grandkids.”</p>
<p>Rey checked her phone. It was rather early, but she wanted to be up. There was much to do before dinner this evening, and one important task topped her list. “Rosie is our guest this summer,” she said. “I’m not putting her to work.”</p>
<p>“Well, I am.” Ben sat up and reached for his contacts case. “She’s the one who wants to manage all the social media. As I understand it, that’s a job.”</p>
<p>“Then make sure you pay her.” At the mention of it, Rey called up her Twitter app. The official handle for <em>The Rebellion</em> had gained several followers just this morning. She smiled as she scrolled the feed, pleased with herself for helping extend the longevity of Ben’s publication. Granted, it was exclusively digital now, but the spirit of the original newspaper remained. So long as causes in need of championing existed, Ben had something to say about them.</p>
<p>Along the way, others stepped in to contribute -- their children, Rose and Armie’s children. The grandchildren the two couples had in common.</p>
<p><em>Speaking of…</em> “Is Rosie even up?” Rey asked.</p>
<p>“Rosie is up,” came a voice from the hallway. “Can I come in, or are you two having old people sex again?”</p>
<p>“Hey, I can’t help it if I’m married to the hottest old lady alive. You have two minutes,” Ben called out, and grabbed Rey’s wrist before she could smack him.</p>
<p>Their youngest grandchild, sixteen-year-old Roseanne Hux, was the daughter of Armie Hux, Junior and Rey and Ben’s daughter, Ami. One look at her fair skin and auburn hair revealed she favored the Hux side of her family. She appeared in the doorway with a retractable leash and a small orange package crushed in her other first.</p>
<p>“Look what I found taped under Granddad’s chair.” The girl tossed the crumpled pack of American Spirits on the bed.</p>
<p>Rey would kill him if the cigarettes didn’t first. “Ben…”</p>
<p>“And if you looked in that pack, you’d have noticed only one was missing. My first smoke in years,” Ben said in his defense. He gave a mournful smile at the ruined cigs. “You know how much these cost, young lady?”</p>
<p>“You promised to take me to California when I graduated high school, Granddad. You can’t do that when you’re dead of lung cancer.” Rosie didn’t wait for his excuse. She clicked her tongue for Wicket to follow and told them they’d be at the beach.</p>
<p>Rey looked at her husband. “Let her cool off.”</p>
<p>“I was telling the truth, Rey,” Ben said. Rey believed him. The vices had dropped away over their five-decade marriage. Neither of them drank anymore, and they gave up weed when Rey first became pregnant. By the Seventies, they were vegetarian, drifting in and out of vegan territory when it suited them.</p>
<p>The changes made a difference. Only Rey could remember how Ben looked at seventy-eight before her “trip.” He’d been a GILF in that alternate universe, yes, but this Ben was like an upgrade. Handsome as ever, sharp as a tack, and virile. Rosie’s crack about “old people sex” often made Rey laugh. She’d close her eyes, though, and it was the first time all over again.</p>
<p>Rey kissed her husband. “Why didn’t you come to me for the <em>or</em>…?”</p>
<p>“Could you imagine the looks on everybody’s faces when they caught us in the van?” Ben asked. The van was currently at The Naboo Gallery for the <em>Time Has Come Today</em> exhibit, curated by Mon Mothma and Leia Netal. With the new course of her life, Rey never worked there, but when the gallery first opened she and Ben became regular exhibit sponsors, then board members. Rey recommended Leia for the position she held in the other life.</p>
<p>“So you snuck a smoke on opening night?” Rey asked. “Why would that make you nervous? You’ve been in the spotlight most of your life.”</p>
<p>“It’s different when your grandkids see it, and judge you.”</p>
<p>Rey slipped out of bed and changed. “Our grandkids are more progressive than you,” they said. “They’re not going to roll their eyes at their hippie granddad.”</p>
<p>“Maybe, maybe not.” Ben lay back, reaching for her. “Why are you up?”</p>
<p>“You know why. I have errands to run before tonight’s dinner.” Rey stepped into her shoes.</p>
<p>“I’ll come with you.”</p>
<p><em>Oh, no.</em> Not for this. “You need to be here for when the boys arrive.”</p>
<p>Ben wasn’t having it, however. He sat up in bed, wearing that same Nirvana shirt he never seemed to want to take off, save for sex. Rey thought at first he had more than one, but couldn’t find copies of it.</p>
<p>“I love you. Please change clothes.” She bent down to kiss him. “I won’t be long.” She was almost out the door when she remembered the cigarettes, and reared back to swipe them before Ben’s hand touched down on the pack.</p>
<p>“I was going to throw them out,” he protested.</p>
<p>“Oh, I believe you.” She winked and left.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rey tossed the cigs in her purse, along with a few necessities for the morning. Stepping out onto the sidewalk, she turned back at the house and smiled. No condos had gone up in this timeline. With some financial help from Ben’s parents, they purchased the home that had, and still, served as <em>The Rebellion</em> headquarters. With the publication digital now, of course, they had use of the whole space and upgraded the fixtures.</p>
<p>Her first stop wasn’t far. The Tico sisters’ former home was still there, and this being still early in the day not many people were out. It relieved Rey, because they likely wouldn’t turn any heads.</p>
<p>She parked as close as possible and pulled a bottle of water from her purse. Amilyn was seated by the line of trees, right where they’d left for 1968, crumpled in a fetal position with eyes closed. Rey knelt down to check on her. The woman was breathing fine, just wiped out from her return.</p>
<p>“Amilyn, can you hear me?” Rey pulled Amilyn up onto her lap and brushed her colored hair from her forehead. Amilyn moaned and opened her eyes, inhaling slowly to gain her bearings.</p>
<p>“Rey?” Her voice was hoarse, and she took some of the water offered her. “Thanks. I’m okay. Just been a long time since I’ve tripped.” Amilyn let Rey help her to sit, and when they got a good look at each other she gasped. “Omigod, you <em>are</em> an old hippie lady,” she said, “but you look great!”</p>
<p>Maybe Amilyn was generous, or Rey was modest. She was seventy-five now, more gray than brown on top, more lines on her face. Ben, of course, kept telling her she was the sexiest grandmother on the planet, and his youthful desires more than made up for their advanced ages.</p>
<p>“Thank you. I’m so glad you’re okay.” Rey hugged her friend. “There is so much to tell you.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>“How many?” Amilyn asked.</p>
<p>Rey held up three fingers. “Jacen, Ben Junior, and Ami.”</p>
<p>Amilyn put a hand on her heart. “After me? Aw.”</p>
<p>“She and young Armie live in D.C. They’re driving down later for dinner. You’re invited, of course.” Though Ben and Rey had married on the twenty-eighth, the fiftieth anniversary dinner was scheduled for tonight to accommodate people coming into town. “I hope you don’t mind a few detours before I take you home. There are some changes since you...went away.”</p>
<p>“Nothing too weird, I hope,” Amilyn said. “Do I still have a bookstore?”</p>
<p>“Oh, yes, and it’s still the place to be. It’s missing one title, though.” When they stopped at a red light, Rey took <em>The Time Tourist</em> from her purse and handed it over. “Did you even know this was Ben’s book first?”</p>
<p>“No!” Amilyn leafed through the pages, then turned to the end to find Ben’s inscription from 1965. “It came to me in a box of other old books. I’m remembering what I know from an alternate timeline, though.”</p>
<p>“Put that in a safe place, please? I think we’ve done enough.”</p>
<p>Amilyn agreed, and Rey caught her up on the last fifty years. <em>The Rebellion</em>, Rose and Armitage’s wedding and family, their respective careers. Baz Netal the younger and Leia. “And now,” Rey said, pulling into a spot in front of a strip of storefronts, “here we are.”</p>
<p>Amilyn looked up at the sign for the Tico Insurance Agency but said nothing. Inside, they greeted Paige, and Rey handed her an envelope. “You know you can pay your premiums online now, Rey,” Paige said, but smiled at her.</p>
<p>“I was coming here anyway. I’m picking up the cake from the bakery next door.”</p>
<p>Paige sat at the reception desk and started typing on the computer. “You sure you’re not checking up on us to see if we’re still coming?” Paige side-eyed her. “You know we are.”</p>
<p>“Am I that obvious?”</p>
<p>“I’d say so.” This came from another woman emerging from a back room. Rey watched for Amilyn’s reaction and saw what she expected, slight confusion based on the woman’s appearance.</p>
<p>She had to remain silent, though, because in this timeline Bazine Netal, Senior patronized Amilyn’s store.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Back in the car, heading to Amilyn’s house, the other woman was still processing the revelation. “Okay, explain that, please.”</p>
<p>“When Ben and I returned from Vegas, not everybody was thrilled with our news. Rose, for one,” Rey said, and laughed at the memory. “She was furious we got married without her, but she eventually forgave us. Naturally, Bazine was also livid, and Poe was there for the rebound.”</p>
<p>Amilyn nodded. “And I know what happened there.”</p>
<p>“Poe still took off, we never saw him again. But Bazine did have a good support system, namely Paige,” Rey said. She explained Paige’s previous animosity toward her regarding “stealing” Ben, then added, “What struck me was that she’d mellowed out when we came back from Vegas. It took me a while to figure out, but I had the impression Paige was okay with the idea of Bazine and Ben because Ben was a safe choice. He wasn’t into her, which meant maybe Bazine might stray once in a while. It took some time, but we all eventually became friends.”</p>
<p>“Paige was in love with her,” Amilyn said.</p>
<p>“Still is, you saw them.” Rey turned onto Amilyn’s street. “Once they were able to legally marry, they did.” She parked by her friend’s home; it was like the wind chimes and chonky cat hadn’t moved an inch. “All these years I’ve lived, I’d see that medal Ben wears around his neck. Mary opening her arms to the world in a loving gesture. That’s how Ben saw it, love as the ultimate cure-all. He was right.”</p>
<p>Rey had to blink back tears. “Armitage had a heart attack about ten years ago, but Rose was with him and called an ambulance. They got to him in time. I remembered how Bazine died in the original timeline, too, and I started up a monthly peer group for breast self-exams. Paige wheedled her into joining, and that’s how Bazine caught her cancer early in this timeline,” she said. “It’s occurred to me that love kept these people alive. It’s kept me alive all this time.”</p>
<p>Amilyn reached over and took Rey’s hand.</p>
<p>“Come to dinner tonight,” Rey said, “and you’ll see the end result.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Rey loved a full house. She loved having all of her children together in one place. It didn’t happen so often anymore, and she accepted it. Her sons and daughter had their own lives, careers. She loved them fiercely, and their partners and their children. Ask her what could possibly improve upon this scene and she’d answer, “Great-grands.” More babies to cuddle.</p>
<p>Everybody had gathered in the living room, once the newspaper’s office. Over the years they’d expanded this room and the kitchen, giving the home a more open concept look. Still, it was home as evidenced by all the photos on the mantels and walls.</p>
<p>Rey listened in on the different conversations, taking in her extended family. The Huxes and their son John. Paige and Bazine. Baz Junior and Leia. She drifted closer to the fireplace and paid silent tribute to those unable to be there: Ben’s parents. Luke and Mara. Jacen.</p>
<p>Ben came up behind her with an extra flute of sparkling cider. “To absent friends,” he said, and they clinked glasses.</p>
<p>“To absent friends.”</p>
<p>“Can we eat now?”</p>
<p>Rey nearly spat out her drink, laughing. “Not everybody’s here yet.” Rosie and her older sister were bringing the last grandchild in from the airport, and Amilyn was on her way.</p>
<p>“Why did you invite the tarot lady from the mall?” Ben asked her, looking skeptical. “You’re the one who insisted on a family party.”</p>
<p>“I did, and what’s a party without entertainment?” Amilyn would dine as a guest, yes, but Rey had also hired her tarot services for the evening, under the guise of an early birthday gift for Rosie. That was one reason, anyway.</p>
<p>Rose joined them, putting her arm around Rey. “Lighten up, Ben. You don’t want to know your destiny?”</p>
<p>“I had a reading done once. Lady said my lifeline had been realigned to the correct path,” Ben said. “No clue what she meant by that.”</p>
<p>Rey sipped her drink, shrugging when Ben looked to her for an explanation.</p>
<p>“Well, I want a reading,” Rose said. “Lottery numbers would be nice, too.”</p>
<p>“I don’t think that’s her forte,” Rey said, and watched the door as Amilyn came up the porch. She made introductions where needed, and shortly afterward the rest of the family arrived.</p>
<p>As the group moved toward the table to begin dinner, Rey introduced Amilyn to her oldest grandson. “Han just got back from New York. His first book is due out next year.”</p>
<p>Han was a handsome hybrid of his parents with lighter hair, and his grandfather’s infectious smile. He enjoyed esoteric subjects, much like the ones in the books Amilyn sold.</p>
<p>“Really? Have you been by my store?”</p>
<p>“Many times,” he said. “I love your selection.”</p>
<p>Amilyn nodded, shaking his hand. “You know, you do look familiar,” she said. If she was covering for the memory gap Rey couldn’t tell; the two young people had gotten on immediately and forgot about Rey as they walked to the table.</p>
<p>“Oh, look at that,” Ben said, coming to his wife’s side, “you sat them together. That’s convenient.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t it, though?” It startled her a moment when Ben began pulling her not toward the table, but out to the porch. “What are you doing?”</p>
<p>“I need a minute alone,” he said. Outside he sealed his mouth over hers in a long kiss. “Got something in my pocket for you.”</p>
<p>“Ben, we have company.”</p>
<p>He raised an eyebrow at her. “I had this repaired. New face, new battery, new strap. Happy anniversary, Rey.” Ben lifted her wrist and affixed the old Mickey Mouse watch. She’d treasured it for decades even when it didn’t work.</p>
<p>Ben pressed his fingers under her chin and tilted her head. “Don’t forget to wind it.”</p>
<p>“Of course.”</p>
<p>They stood together a moment, arm in arm, looking through the large windows at their gathering. Tears were coming whether Rey wanted them or not.</p>
<p>Han and Amilyn were in full flirt mode, which didn’t go unnoticed by them. Ben pressed his lips to her ear. “You’re not going to be happy until you’ve married off everybody in town, are you?”</p>
<p>“A wise man once said the love you take is equal to the love you make,” Rey said, squeezing him. “Sue me if I want to get as much as I can.”</p>
<p>“Come talk to me after we’ve gotten rid of all these people.” Ben led her inside to the head of the table, where they would sit together.</p>
<p>Rey smiled. <em>Count on it.</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>THE END</strong>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>For more Reylo (all contemporary AU) by me:</p>
<p><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28745784">Entwined</a> (winemaker!Ben, innkeeper!Rey)<br/><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29235762">Happy Little Trees</a> (artist!Ben, massage therapist!Rey)<br/><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25890961">In Focus</a> (campaign publicist!Ben, photographer!Rey)<br/><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29953407">One Skis, The Other Doesn't</a> (rom-com fluff)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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